THE PHILOSOPHY OF

THE UPANISHADS
 87803

REDISCOVERING INDIA

PHILOSOPHY OF THE
UPANISHADS
Ancient Indian Metaphysics

GOUGH EDWARD

Vol.4

COSMO PUBLICATIONS
First Published 1882
Ibis series 1987

Published by
RANI KAPOOR (Mrs)
COSMO PUBLICATIONS
24-B, Ansari Road, Daiyaganj
Sew Delhi-110002 (India)

Printed at
M/S Mehra Offset
New Delhi
 PREFACE.

I hope that this book may be more or less useful to two

classes of readers.
Those interested in the general history of philosophy
will find in it an account of a very early attempt, on
the part of thinkers of a rude age and race, to form a
cosmological theory. The real movement of philosophic
thought begins, it is true, not in India, but in Ionia;
but some degree of interest may still be expected to
attach to the procedure of the ancient Indian cosmo-
logists. The Upanishads are so many “songs before
sunrise/'—spontaneous effusions of awakening reflec¬
tion, half poetical, half metaphysical, that precede the
conscious and methodical labour of the long succes¬
sion of thinkers to construct a thoroughly intelligible
conception of the sum of things. For the general
reader, then, these pages may supply in detail, and
in the terms of the Sanskrit texts themselves, a treat¬
ment -of the topics slightly sketched in the third
chapter of Archer Butler’s first series of “ Lectures
on the History of Ancient Philosophy.” The Upanr-
shads exhibit the pantheistic view of things in a naively
h
Vi PREFACE.

poetical expression, and at the same time in its coarsest

form.1
To readers specially interested in Indian matters an
introduction to the Upanishads is indispensable, and
these pages will help to supply a want hitherto unslip-
plied. The Upanishads are an index to the intellectual
peculiarities of the Indian character. The thoughts
they express are the ideas that prevail throughout all
subsequent Indian literature, much of which will be
fully comprehensible to those only who cany with
4h<rm a knowledge of these ideas to its perusaL A
study of the Upanishads is the starting-point in any
intelligent study of Indian philosophy. As regards
religion, the philosophy of the Upanishads Is the
groundwork of the various forms of Hinduism, and
the Upanishads have been justly characterised by
GoldsttLcker as “the basis of the enlightened faith of
India."
The Upanishads are treatises of various length,
partly poetical, partly theosophical, which close the
canon of Vedic revelation. The term Upanishad im¬
ports mystic teaching, and the synonymous term
Vedanta means a final instalment of the Veda. The
Upanishads are also called Vedantas, and the Aupani-
shadl MTmanaa or philosophy of the Upanishads, in
its developed form, is known as the Vedantic system.
&uti, the Vedic revelation, consists of two parts, of a
lower and a higher grade,—the Karmakag.$a, or portion
treating of sacrifices, immemorial usages, and theogony;

1 “WoCen wrr den sogenannten PantheUmu* fa seiner poetlschen,

erinbeasten, oder Venn nan will, loaaaesten Gestalt bo bat
mas aieh dsfUr fa dea morgcnltmdUehen Diohtem end die
bea&eaten DanteDunffen finden rich fa den Indischen.”—Hjcgel.
 PREFACE. vii
and the JMnaka^cta, or portion treating of the release
of the soul from metempsychosis, by means of a recog¬
nition of its real nature as one with the characterless
and impersonal Self. This impersonal Self, Brahman,
as distinguished from the personal soul, the living,
conscious, and migrating spirit, the Jlva or Jlvatman
or YijAanatman, is also styled the Paramatman or
highest Self. The mystic teaching in which the Yedic
revelation culminates is relative to the nature of this'
highest and impersonal Self. The Karmahanda, or
ritual portion of the Yeda, is contained in the Mantras
or hymns of the Rishis, the spontaneous effusions of
primitive Indian nature-worship,-and the Brahman as
or liturgic and legendary compilations of the specialised
sacrificial functionaries. Theosophic teaching is present,
in combination with liturgic and mythologic elements,
in the Aranyakas, a portion of the Yedic aggregate
intimately allied to the Brahmanas. This teaching
is further segregated and explicitly set forth in the
Upanishads, and forms the Jiianakanda or theosophic
portion of the Yedic revelation. As compared with the
religion of sacrifices and ancestral rites, this teaching
forms a higher religion, a more perfect way, for the
recluses of the forest,—a religion which will be seen to
be largely metaphysical. Treatises bearing the name
of Upanishads are numerous. Those in highest esteem
have always been the Chhaadcgya, Byihadaraijyaka,
list, Kena, Katha, Praina, Mundaka, Mandukya, Aita-
reya, Taittirlya, &veta£vatara, Maitrayagcya, and Kau-
shltaklbrah m ana Upanishads. The date of the Upani¬
shads, like that of most of the ancient works ot Sanskrit
literature, is altogether uncertain. Any date that may
hare been assigned is purely conjectural; and all that
iii PREFACE.

re c*™ affirm in this regard is, that in relation to that

Lterature they are of primitive antiquity, and the earliest
Locuments of Indian religious metaphysics.
The greatest of the expositors of the philosophy of
he TJpanishads is Sankara or ^ankarach arya. A great
part of the matter of this Volume is extracted from the
various 'writings ascribed to him. He is said tu have
been a native of Ketfala or Malabar, and to have
flourished in thb eighth century of the Christian era.
He is generally represented as having spent the greater
part of his life as an itinerant philosophic disputant
and religions controversialist. The Buddhists in his
time 'were flourishing and widely predominant in India
under the patronage of powerful Rajas, and we may
presume that the great VedSntic doctor was thoroughly
intimate with the tenets of Buddhist philosophy and
religioni .His exposition of some of these in his com¬
mentary on the aphorisms of the Vedanta is admirably
perspicuous. The teaching of Sankara himself is the
natural and legitimate interpretation of the doctrines
of the TJpanishads. It is known as AdvaitavMa, the
theory of universal unity, abstract identity, or absolute
idealism. The Advaitavadins or Indian idealists* are
therefore often styled the Sankaras or followers of
Sankara. They represent Indian orthodoxy in its
purest form. The commentaries on the TJpanishads
ascribed to Sankara are elucidated in the glosses of
Anandajfi§nagirij, a writer to whom reference will be
found from tame to time in the following pages. The
most illustrious of the successors of Sankara, and, next
to f§ankara» the greatest of the Indian schoolmen. Is
Midhava or Madhavacharya, known also by the sur¬
name of Sayana. He will also be referred to in this
 PREFACE. ix

book. His great work is his series of grammatical and

exegetic commentaries on the Yedas. In philosophical
discussion his language is remarkably quaint and strik¬
ing. An opponent arguing in a circle is a man
trying to stand on his own shoulders, and in refuting
another he finds himself breaking a bubble with a
thunderbolt.1 Madhavacharya flourished in the four¬
teenth century.
This book is based upon a series of articles I con¬
tributed some years ago to the Calcutta, Review. The
first of these, intitled “ Ancient Indian Metaphysics,"
was published in the number for October 1876. This
was followed by five articles on the * Philosophy of the
Upanisnads," the first of these appearing in January
1878, and the last in April 1880. I beg to record my
best thanks to Mr. Thomas Smith, the proprietor of the
Review, for his kind permission to me to utilise the
materials of these. articles in preparing the present
work. The materials I have reproduced are for the
most part the translations. These, already containing
the most important texts of the TJpanishads, were
indispensable for any new presentation of primitive
Indian metaphysics. They have in every case been
rewritten, new matter has been added, and everything
old is transformed and transposed, so that this book is
not to be regarded us a reprint, but as a new work. My
translations will be found to include the whole of the
Mun<Jaka, ELatha, &vet§ivatara, and Mandukya TTpani*
shads, the greater part of the Taittirlya and Brihada*
ranyaka, and portions of the. Chhandogya and Elena,
together with extracts from the works of the Indian
schoolmen. The matter of the book has been taken in
1 Cf. “ Who breaks a butterfly upou a wheel ? PorE.
X PREFACE.

every case at first hand from original Sanskrit sources.

Wherever the work is expository, I have studiously
avoided interpolation, the purpose being to present the
primitive Indian philosophy precisely as it is, in the
terms of the philosophers themselves, and to leave the
reader to form his own judgment about it. The San¬
skrit philologist has to wprk in a hard and unproduc¬
tive soil, and this judgment may not perhaps be very
favourable. At any rate. I make no claim. There is
nothing that a writer 'on ancient thought, and particu¬
larly on ancient Oriental thought, has to be more upon
his guard against, than the tritium mbreptwnris, the per¬
mission to his own preconceptions to insinuate them¬
selves among the data he has to deal with. In every
expository paragraph, therefore, every statement, every
figure, and every simile is extracted from a Sanskrit
authority. Most of these are to be found in any
Sanskrit treatise on the Vedanta. They may all be-
found in the following works, which, with others, have
furnished the matter of- this book,—the various Upani-
shads themselves, Sankara’s commentaries on the
TTpanishads, Anandajfianagiri’s glosses on these com¬
mentaries, Sankara’s commentary on the Sarlrakasutra
or aphorisms of the Vedanta philosophy, Govindananda's
gloss on this commentary, the Vedantasara, the Vid-
vanmanoraAjml, the SuhodhinJ, the T7pade£asahasrl, the
Padayojanika or commentary on the TTpadetSasahasrl,
the Vivekachudamaiji, the Atmabodha, the Sarvadar-
fanasangraha, the Sankhyaiattvakaunru dl, and the SSn-
khyapravachanabhashya.
As this hook is the outcome of a personal study of
the Sanskrit originals, I may be permitted to point out
the conclusions in regard , to eariv Tndin* -nltnnannVir
 PREFACE. xi

■which, thus far, I have arrived at for myself. These

are:—
First, That the earliest succession of cosmological
conceptions in India was this—
(i.) Brahmavada and Mayavada,the theory of the
Self and the self-feigning world-fiction,
afterwards developed into the Vedantic
system:
(2.) {§unyavada and VijiAnavada, the theory of
the aboriginal vacuum or blank, and of
the sensational and fluxional nature of
the world, presented in Buddhism:
(3.) Purashabahutvavada and Pradhanavada, the
theory of a plurality of Selves, and of
the reality and independent existence of
the world,, presented in the doctrine of
the Sankhyas or ** enuu+erative ” philo*-
sophers.
Secondly, That Maya is part and parcel of the
primitive Indian cosmological conception, as
exhibited in the Upanishads themselves, and
not, as Colebrooke imagined, and has led his
successors to imagine, a later graft upon the old
Vedantic philosophy.
Thirdly, That as regards the alleged affinity between
the Indian and the bTeo-.platonic philosophy,
it is possible that a phrase or two, a «fnnila here
and there, of the Indian sophists, may have
found their way into the Alexandrian schools, and
influenced, the work of Ammonius, Plotinus,
and their successors; but that the Neo-platonio
philosophy, as a whole, has its virtual pre-
xii PREFACE.

existence in the earlier constructions of Hellenic

thought, and naturally develops itself out of
them.

As regards this third conclusion, the general reader

•will he able to form his own opinion. I think he will
pronounce that India had little intellectual wealth for
exportation to the Alexandrian emporium.
A, E. G.

Maksham Hall,
Norwich,
July 2i, 188a,
 CONTENTS

CHAPTER I.

THE ANTECEDENTS OF INDIAN METAPHYSICS—METEMPSYCHOSIS.

PAGE

The scope of the wort.i

Indian philosophy the work of 'a lower race, of mixed Negrito,
Tatar, and Aryan blood • .2
The Aryan infusion scanty.4
Low thoughts in high words the difficulty of the Orientalist 4
Stationary and progressive order contrasted . . . . 5
Indian philosophy an Oriental philosophy of inertion . .* 6
The social antecedents of Brahmanism and Buddhism . . 7
Personification of elemental forces. . . . . . 8
The spiritual instinct languid. Absence of moral aspiration 1o
The Vedic worship becomes mechanical . . . . 12
First beginnings of cosmologic speculation in the Vedic hymns 13
The PurushasUkta.14
The N&sadiyasukta ..15'
Climatic, ethnological, and religious degeneration in the
Hindu pale.' . . .17
The worship of diva the typical Yogin.18
Self-torture, thaumaturgy, ecstasy. Yoga . . . • 18
Revival of widow-burning. *19
Polyandry. 20
Belief in the migration of the soul and the misery of every
form of life 20
No true help from the gods. Pain in paradise . , . 22
The intolerable prospect of life after life and death after
death. 23
The belief in metempsychosis prevalent among the lower
races of mankind . . ..24
xiv CONTENTS .
TKOM

Current in Egypt Adopted by Empedocles, the Pythago¬

reans, and Plato. 25
Philosophy the release from metempsychosis in the Phrndon 26
Asiatic and European pessimism * .29
Hume's picture of the miseries of life.29
The similar picture of the Indian schoolmen . * .32

CHAPTER IL
THE QUEST OF THE REAL—BRAHMAN ANX> MATA, THE SELF
AHD THE WORLD-FICTIOH.

Fixity amidst the flux of things . 34

Repose and peace amidst the miseries of life . . • 35
Unity amidst the plurality of experience 35
These found at intervals in sleep without a dream 36
Permanently in union with the characterless Self, which is
the object of the name and notion I 36
Brahman the impersonal Self . . * 37
Etymology of the word Brahman. 38
Brahman infinite.. 38
Brahman incogit&ble and ineffable. 39
Brahman the light that irradiates the mental modes . 39
Brahman is pure thought, eternal and objectless * 40
Brahman not to be confused with the personal absolute or
0bti4as Deity. 4*
Bstlnnan the pure light of characterless knowledge . 4»
^fr^hwiau that which being known all things are known,—
. 43
Brahman the principle of reality. The co-eternal principle
Of unreality, MfiyS, the world-fiction . 45
hftyAthe niudon in every individual soui . 4*
IfAyE thefilnaien in aU souls, the unreal emanatory principle
of worldt co-e&ernal with Brahman 47
48
is l£vaara» and passea
49

50
 CONTENTS. xy
FiOl

l^vara the first figment of the world-fiction . ... 53

Hir&nyagarbha* the spirit of dreaming sentiencies' . . 54
Virfij, the spirit of waking sentiencies.55
Six things without beginning.56

CHAPTER IIL

THE RELEASE FROM METEMPSYCHOSIS,

Re-ascent to the fontal Self . 58

Purificatory virtues* renunciation* meditative abstraction*
ecstatic vision* re-union. 59
The VivekachfLd&mani quoted. 60
liberation in this life. 61
The Sandilyavidyd. The soul one with the cosmic soul and .
wi-h the Self «*•••• » . 63
Renunciation* ecstasy* and liberation* as characterised in the
Brihad&ranyaka Upanishad.63
The perfect sage is subject to no moral law . ... 65
But will not therefore do evil.* 66
The mystic syllable Om as an image of Brahman . . . 67
Invocation of Om in the Taittirlya Upanishad ... 68
The MandUkya UpanishctcL The import of Om. The four
states of the soul.69
The waking state.. , 69
The dreaming state.70
The state of dreamless sleep.70
The state of the soul in union with pure Self T . . 71
literal analysis of Om .. . 72
The doctrine of the live vestures of the soul as taught in the
Taittirlya Upanishad.73
The Brahmdnctndavcdli, the second section of the Taittirlya
Upanishad • . . . > - T ... 73
The Self within the mind* inside the heart of every living
thing.74
The soul is the Self, but does dot know itself to be the Self 75
Procession of the five elements* and their progressive concre¬
tion ..75
The first and outermost vesture of the soul is the earthly
body.. 76
xvi CONTENTS .
nos
Within the earthly body is the invisible body that clothes
the soul throughout its migrations . . 77
The second garment, the vesture of the vital airs . 78
The third garment, the vesture of the common sensory 78
The fourth garment, the mental vesture .... 79
The fifth and innermost garment, the vesture of beatitude*
This clothes the soul iu its third state of dreamless sleep 80
Brahman becomes I4vara and passes into seeming plurality 81
The scale of beatitudes that may be ascended by the sage 83
TheBhriguvcdll, the third section of the Taittirlya Upanisbad 85
Steps to the knowledge of Brahman. First step : the earthly
body is Brahman. 85
Second step: the vital air is Brahman. 85
Third step i the common sensory is Brahman 86
Fourth step : the mind is Brahman. 86
Fifth step : the hliss of dreamless sleep is Brahman 86
Outward observances of the meditating sage, and their re*
wards. 87
He is to meditate on the various manifestations of Brahman 87
He strips off the five garments of the soul one after another.
Acquires and exercises magical powers. Sings the song
of universal unity. Is absorbed into the one and all 88
The great text. That art thou. 89
The dialogue of Aruni and Svetaketu from the Chh&ndogya
IJpanishad 90
Allegory of the sweet juices and the honey .... 90
Allegory of the rivers and the sea. 90
Allegory of the tree and its informing life .... 9*
Allegory of the seed of the holy fig-tree ... 91
Allegory of the salt in salt water , . . ...
9*
Allegory of the highwayman and the blindfold traveller 92
Gradual departure of the soul at death. 92
Allegory of the fiery ordeal . . „ #
93
Scholastic explanation of the great text. That art thou .
93

CHAPTER IV.
TH$ MUOTAKA UPANISHAD.

The religion of rites and the religion of gnosis, the inferior

science and the superior science * • . .
95
 CONTENTS. xvii
PAGE

The religion of rites prolongs the migration of the soul, 96

The religion of gnosis frees the soul from further migration . 97
This religion or philosophy must be learned from an authorised
exponent. 98
Mundaka Upantshad. First Mundaka, First Section . 99
The SiuSoxtf .......... 99
To know the Self is to know all things ..... 99
Simil of the spider.. 99
Hnmr’s misapprehension of this simile. 100
The Demiurgus and the world-fiction. 100
First Mundaka, Second Section ... . 101
The rewards of the prescriptive sacra transient. The sage
must turn his back upon them all .. . . . 102
He must repair to an accredited teacher .... 103
Secpnd Mundaka, First Section. 103
Simile of the fire and the sparks. 103
Purusba characterised as in the Purushasfikta • . « 104
The vision of the Self within the heart is the only salvation 106
Second Mundaka, Second Section. 106
Use of the mystic syllable Om. 106
The ties of the heart loosed by seeing the Self, the light of
the world .. X07
Third Mundaka, First Section. xo8
Allegory of the two birds on one tree .... * xo8
Mental purity required of the aspirant * . . . . 109
A pure mind the only mirror that reflects the ,Self * • no
Third Mundaka, Second Section.. lit
The Self manifests itself to the perfect Bage . f . hi
He loses himself in it as a river loses itself in the sea * i 112
Fichte quoted. Perfect peace from conscious participation
in the divine life . . ...... m

CHAPTER V.

THE KATHA VEINISHAIT.

The story of Nachiketas and the regent of the dead . xx6

Ka(Ju$ Vpanishad, First Valll. lt7
Yams tells Nachiketas to choose, three gifts . . . 118
The first gift, that he may return to his father . * 11S
xviii CONTENTS .
PAti*

The second gift, a knowledge of the Nachiketa lire . . 118

Disquieting doubt of awakening reflection . * . .120
The third gift, a knowledge of the soul, and of its real nature* 120
This preferable even to the pleasures that the gods enjoy . 121
Second Valli. The pleasurable and the good . . .122
The liturgic experts are blind leaders of the blind . , 122
The seekers of the Self aTe few.*23
Renunciation and meditative abstraction the only path
safety. 124
The mystic syllable Om; must be employed . 124
Antithetic epithets of the Self. 125
The Self manifests itself to the purified aspirant . X26
Third VallL The individual soul end the cosmic soul . 126
Allegory of the chariot. 127
The goal is release from metempsychosis by re-union with
the Self. .... . ... 127
The path of release is fine as the edge of a razor . 128
The liberated theosophist wakes up out of this dream-world 129
Fourth Valli *■*••••* 129
The sage eludes the net of death, and has no fear . 130
It Is illusion that presents the manifold of experience . * 131
Parasha or Brahman is pure light ...... 132
Fifth VallL Various manifestations of Purusha .
*3*
Ved&ntic proofs of the existence of the Self .
*33
What becomes of the soul at death
*34
The Self is like a permeating fire or pervading atmosphere • 134
SitaHeof the sun Unsullied by the impurities, it looks down
*p<ra ...
*34
Erodas&ig peace for them only that find the light of the
"world, in their own hearts
135
SirthValll ....
_ _ ■ *•***»» *35
The world-tree and the seed it springs'from .... 136
Th» Self to be seen only as mirrored on the purified mind .
*37
Ecstatic vision and recovery of immortality ....
*37
Apathy, yaenity, and trance the steps of aceess to the 'Self .
*3*
The smtfs path of egress and Wont to the courts of Brahma
*39
The allegory of the chariot compared with the Platonic figure
in the Phwdrus
S40
 CONTENTS . x;x

CHAPTER VI.
THE BRXHADAHANTAKA LTPANLSHAD,
PAO*
Dialogues of the Erihadaranyttka ZTpanishad . *44
Aj&taiatru and B&laki. 144
AjataiSatru teaches Balaki the doctrine of the three states of
the soul and of the Self beyond. *47
Ysjnavaikya and Maitreyl. 150
Things that are dear are dear for the sake of the Self . 150
It is the Self that must be seen ...... 150
All things one in the Self, as partial sounds in a total sound 152
The Vedas an exhalation of the Self. . 152
No more consciousness for the liberated sage 153
The duality of subject and object is unreal .... *54
The disputation at the sacrifice of Janaka .... *55
Y&jfiaval -ya takes the prise without waiting to dispute *55
A^vala challenges him to explain the symbolic import of the
several factors of the sacrifice ...... 156
ArtabhSga to enumerate the elements of sensible experience *57
The mind and senses of the liberated sage are dissolved at
death .......... *58
The soul of the unphilosophic man enters a new body . *59
Bhujyu examines him on the reward of the horse-sacrifice . z6o
Uahasta demands an ocular demonstration of the Self. The
Self Is the unsnen seer. 161
KahtfLa questions him about the one Self in ajl things living x6i
The visionary sage is the true Brahman .... *62
GSigi questions him. What is the web of the world woven
over? ....... . 162
Udd&laka questions him on the nature of the thread soul,
Hiranyagarbha. 164
Ou the nature of the cosmic soul or Demiurgus . 165
The Demiurgus is the internal ruler or actuator. He informs
and animates the elements . 166
He informs and animates all living things .... 167
The Demiurgus is Brahman manifested in the world < 168
G&rgI questions him. What is the web of the world-fiction
woven across ... 169
It is woven over the Self, the principle that gives fixity and
order to the world.. 170
XX CONTENTS .
pxne
The Self is uniform, characterless vision and thought * . 171
Vidagdha questions him. All things full of gods . » ,172
Vidagdlia fails to answer in turn, and perishes . . **174
YSjnavalkya’s parable. Man is a forest-tree: what root does
he spring from again when cut down t » . . . 174
The sum of the whole matter. Ecstatic union is the goal . 175
YajAavalkya’s visit to Janaka. Their conversation. The
passage of the soul through the five vestures to the Self
beyond all fear.175
YajAavalkya visits Janaka again. Their conference. What
is the light of man ?. . .... 177
The true light is the light within the heart.179
The three states of the migrating soul . . • . . 179 '
In sleep the soul creates a dream-world • . . . 180
Simile of the fish.x8r
Simile of the falcon.181
liberation is perfect satisfaction, and exemption from aU*fear 182
All differences vanish in the unitary indifference of the Self. 182

CHAPTER VIL

TBtE SENSATIONAL NIHILISM OF THE BUDDHISTS—THE COSMOLOGY

OF THE SANKHYAS.

The doctrine of the blank. The original nothingness of the

Buddhists . , , 183
This doctrine as old as the tTpanishads. It is the primitive
antithesis to the thesis of the Self and the world-fiction 185
The Buddhist teaching *85
The Inner light moonshine, the Self zero , 186
AH things momentary and fluxionaL All consciousness is
sensational . . .. 186
^ahkaTgchsrya*s statement and refutation of Buddhist nihilism *87
statement ofBuddhist sensationalism , X90
Bus refutation of this sensationalism . . 192
Is he self-eonsktent t Relative and provisional reality of the
world ..... 197
The philosophy of the Stakhyaa & real and independent
principle of emanation, Pradhfcua. A plurality of Puru-
shas or Selves *
 CONTENTS. xxi
PAGE

The Sankliyas pervert tlxe plain sense of the Upanishads . 199

Prakriti in the Upanishads equivalent to Maya or Avidya . 200
Sankarach&rya disallows the Sankhya appeal to the Katha
Upanishad . 201
The ** undeveloped ’* principle of the Katha Upanishad not
Pradh&na, but Maya, the cosmic body .... 202
SankarachSrya disallows the Sankhya appeal to the Svetas-
vaiara Upanishad .... ... 203
The S&nkhyas deny the existence of Isvara, the cosmic soul,
or world-evolving deity. 204
Sankarfichfirya maintains against them the existence of Isvara 206
The migrating souls, not livara, tc blame for the inequalities
of their lots.207
The world has had no beginning. Souls have been in migra¬
tion from eternity ..208
The S&nkhya doctrine of real modifications counter to the
Ved&ntlc tenet of fictitious emanations • . , 209

CHAPTER VTIL

THE SVETASVATARA UPANISHAD.

This Upanishad teaches the same doctrines as the other

Upanishads. 211
The Sankhya originally a new nomenclature, not a new
philosophy .......... 212
S'vetd&vatara Upanishad, First Section . . . . - . 5613
All things emanate out of l£vara’s &akti or Maya, t.e., out of
the power or fiction of the cosmic soul .... 213
Its vara the cycle of the universe. 214
The river of metempsychosis. 214
The triad based on Brahman. 215
Maya or Prakyiti the genetrix ingenita. 215
Maya or Prakyiti the handmaid of the Dewiurgus . 2X6
Meditation leads to exaltation to the courts of Brahma, and
to extrication from metempsychosis. 217
Repetition of Om reveals Brahman, as friction elicits five 217
Second Se tion. Invocation of the sun-god, by the aspirant
about to practise Yoga . . . 2lS
Fixation of the body and withdrawal of the seizes . 219
 CONTENTS.
xzi!
PAGE
2x9
Si<ros o£ approaching ecstatic vision . • *
The vision unites the soul with the world-pervading Self ^20

Third Section. Glories of Rudra, the cosnr’c soul 220

Antithetic epithets of Purusha or Brahman^. * ?22

Fourth Section, The world is a manifestation of Brahman 223

Allegory of the two birds on one tree ... * 223
224
Pmkriti is illusion, and l£vara the illusionist
l^vara, the cosmic soul, present in every heart 225

In the Self there is neither night nor day 225

Invocation of Rudra for aid in meditation 226

Fifth Section. Knowledge and illusion 226

Kapila, the founder of the S&nkhya, extolled 226

l4vara spreads the net of metempsychosis . . • 22$

Sixth Section. The world is an exhibition of ftvara’s glory 230

231
l»vara the divine spider..
The Sejf is the light of the world . 232

Knowledge alone saves from the miseries of repeated livts 233

CHAPTER IX.

THE PRIMITIVE ANTIQUITY OF THE DOCTRINE OF MAYA.

The world dissolves itself in the view of the meditating Yogin 235
The-current opinion untenable, that the tenet of Maya is an
innovation.237
Colehrooke the author of this opinion.237
M&y& a.vital dement of the primitive Indian cosmicol con¬
ception ..238
Part of Colebrooke's statement a glaring error . . . 238
The Sutras of the'Vedanta are in themselves obscure . • 239
Texts of the Upanishads tOach the unreality of the world . 240
This doctrine present in a Vedic hymn . . . ^ 240
Present in the Brxhad&rany&ka Upaniahad .... 241
Which allows only a quad-existence to everything else than
the Self. 243
Many names given in the Upanishads to the principle of
unreality.244
The duality of subject and object has only a quasi-existence 245
The unreality of the world taught in the Chli&ndogya Upani-
shad 245
 CONTENTS. rxiii
PAGE
' The Mundaka TJpauiskad speaks of daily life and Vedic
worship as an illnsion ..246
The Katha Upanishad contrasts the life of illusion with the
life of knowledge.246
The unreality of the world implied in the sole reality of the Self 247
The unreality of the world taught in the aphorisms of the
Vedanta. 248
Duality only a distinction of everyday experience. . . 249
The manifold only "a modification of speech, a change, a
name ”.250
The variety of life is like the variety of a dream . . . 250
The migrating soul as such is a mere semblance . . *251
Sankara emphatic in proclaiming the unreality of the world 251
The world is as fictitions as an optical illusion . . 253
Falsity of the many, troth only of the one . . . >254
The world is a dream, the sage awakes to the truth . . 253
The costnic body and the cosmic sonl alike fictitious . . 256
Thesonrceof Colebrooke’s er-ortheassertionof Vijnanabhikshn 258
This assertion altogether baseless.260
The ocean of metempsychosis reflects the sun of Self . . 260
Recapitulation. The philosophy of the Upanishads a new
religion for the recluses of the jangle .... 262
The old religion left valid for the many. The three paths of
the passing soul.264
Purificatory value of the old religion.264
The old religion a conformity to immemorial pieties. The
new religion an effort to rise above mental and corporeal
limitations to re-union with the one and all . . .263
The new religion no more spiritual than the old conformity . 261}
No aspiration towards the true and the good, but only a
yearoing for repose. Yet the highest product of the
Indian mind. . . 267
 THE

PHILOSOPHY OF THE UPANISHADS.

CHAPTER I.

THE ANTECEDENTS OF INDIAN METAPHYSICS-

METEMPSYCHOSIS.

“ The one spirit's plastic stress

Sweeps through the dull dense world, compelling there
All new successions to the forms they wear;
Torturing the unwilling dross that checks its flight
To its own likeness, as each mass may bear;
And bursting in its beauty and its might,
From trees and beasts and men into the heavens’ light.”
—Shxllet.

“ Alors j’ai essayd de traverser la seine mobile du monde pour p£n£-

trer jusqu’au fond immuable, au principe indpuisable de la vie univer*
selle. Lh, je l’avoue, j’ai eu un moment d’eblouissement et d’ivresse;
j’ai era voir Dieu. L’fitre en soi, l’itre infini, absolu, universal, que
peut-on contempler de plus sublime, de plus vaste, de pijs profond?
C'est le dieu Fan, dvoqud pour la confusion des {doles de I’imagination
et de la conscience humaines. Hais ce Dieu vivant, que dWperfeo*
tions, que de misires il dtale, si je regarfle dans le monde, son acta
incessant! Ft si je veux le voir en soi et dans son fond, je ne trouve
plus que l’£tre en puissance, sans lumi&re, sans couleur, sans forme, urns
essence dlterminle, ablme t^ndbreux oh TOrient croyait contempler la
supreme vdritd, et oh Tadmirable philosophic grecque ne trouvait que
chaos et non-6tre. Mon illusion n’a pas tenu contre Evidence, contra
la foi du genre humain. Dieu ne pouv&it 6tre oh n'est pas le beau, le
pur, le parfait Vachebot.

It is the purpose of the following pages to present the char L

earliest types of Indian thought in the terms of then* mow of
thinkers themselves, and in relation to the popular *wor ’
 2 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. i. medium in which they had their life. The reader will
be conducted along the first and only important stages
of the history of Indian philosophy. The data are such
that this history can only be worked out by looking at
the form of the several cosmical conceptions, and find¬
ing out how they rise one out of another in the process
of conflict and supersession. The earliest Indian notioja
of the totality of things is given in the Upanishads.
These, the earliest records of Indian speculation, pro¬
pound the miseries of metempsychosis, and the path of
release from these miseries by recognition of the sole
reality of the Self, and the unreality of the world and
of all the forms of life-that people it. They retain the
popular religious imagery, and prescribe the purification
of the mind, the renunciation of the world, the practice
of rigid and insensible postures of the body, and pro¬
longed meditative abstraction to reach the unity of
characterless thought, as the several stages towards the
recognition of the one and only Self, and ecstatic vision
of, and re-union with it. This is the safe starting-
point from which to follow the logical movement. The
further,progress of the. history of Indian philosophy
will rest on probabilities. Certainty as regards the
chronological succession is beyond the reach of the
Orientalist, and he has to be content with approxima-
tions to it. When everything is done, and the history
of Indian philosophy has been fairly traced, the work
will always remain little more than a preliminary and
outlying portion of the general history of the human
nnnd. The work will be an exhibition of the thought’s
of thmkers of a lower race, of a people of stationary
culture, whose intellectual growth stands almost apart
to“1 general movement of human intelligence.
£*** aeihiistory <>i Indian philosophy has to
Ssy ^ the P^duce of an uhprogressive por-
SGt* Wd Negroid aboriSin€S- Tatar hordes,
.and successive Aiyan swarms have severally contri-
 OF TlfE VPAN1 SHADS. 3

buted their blood to mould tlie Brahman theosophist. chap, l

Like every other thinker, he is limited by the type of
nervbus mechanism he has inherited, by the ancestral
conditions of his life, and by the material and spiritual
present .which environs him. It is under these limita¬
tions that he is to make himself what he is. As regards
the limitations of race and hereditary nature, the greatest
confusion has been introduced into the popular study
of Indian matters by the term*Aryan. This word has
been fertile in every variety of fallacy, theoretical and
practical. Before the work of thought begins in India
the invading Aryan tribes have become Indo-Arians
or Hindus. They have been assimilated to and absorbed
into the earlier and ruder populations of modified Negrito ■
and Tatar type,, whom they at first fought against as
the dark-skinned Dasyus, and made to till the soil and
drudge for them as iaudras.
As Professor Huxley says, “ The old Sanskrit litera¬
ture proves that the Aryan population of India came
in from the north-west at least three thousand years
ago. In the Veda these people portray themselves
in characters that might have fitted the Gauls, the
Germans, or the Goths. "Unfortunately there is no
evidence whether tibey were fair-haired or not. India
was already peopled by a dark-complexioned people,
most like the Australian aborigines, and speaking a
group of languages called Dravidian.” These races
were Negroid indigenes recruited with Tatar blo&d.
« They were fenced in,” he proceeds, “ on the north by
the barrier of the Himalayas; but the Aryans poured
in from the plains of Central Asia over the Himalayas
into the great river basins of the Indus and the Ganges,
where they have been in the main absorbed into the
pre-existing population, leaving as evidence of their
immigration an extensive modification of the physi¬
cal characters of the population, a language, and a
literature.”
 4 THE PHILOSOPHY

Ch>p. x. Following Dr. Latham and Mr. Norris, Dr. Carpenter

rue points out that it is only by an error that the ordinary
Hindu population are supposed to be the descendants of
this invading branch of the Aryan stock. “ The influ¬
ence,” he says, “ of the Aryan invasion upon the language
and population of Northern India was very much akin
to that of the Norman invasion upon those of England;”-
This analogy, it must be remarked, is superficial, and
fails in a most important point. The Norman invaders
were not of a higher stock than the English, the Saxons,
and the Anglo-Danes; the Aryan immigrants into India
underwent a progressive deterioration through climatic
influences and intermixture with low and melanous
faces akin to the Bhils, the Kols, and Sontlmls of the
present day. “ The number of individuals of thr. invad¬
ing race was so small in proportion to that of the indi¬
genous population as to be speedily merged in it, not,
however, without contributing to an elevation of its
physical characters; a large number of new words hav¬
ing been in like manner introduced, without any essential
change in the type of the original languages,” the vari¬
ous dialects of Northern India. “And thus the only
distinct traces of the Aryan stock are to he found in
the Brahmanical caste, which preserves, though with
gteafc corruption, the original Brahmanical religion, and
keeps up the Sanskrit as its classical language. Ic is
certain however, that this race is far from being of pure
descent, having intermingled to a considerable extent
with the ordinary Hindu population.”
In treating of Indian philosophy, a writer has to deal
tfc* difficult*
oftbeOrfS- with thoughts of a lower order than tne thoughts of
the everyday life of Eutope, Looking at the language
wt??rpWd*ith®fne^lniedittm of intel%e«ce in
w^h ho hv^the thoughts of the European are rich
SL?* °f Qreek’
nhiW>,wr u nm ako thafc such ^iments of
aud Christian
philosophic thought as are to be found in the Indian
 OF THE UPANISHAVS. s
cosmologies are embedded in masses of religious imagery chap. i.
of rude and inartistic kind. We are treading the —
rock-cut temples of Ellora, not the Parthenon. The
great difficulty lies in this, that a low order of ideas
has to be expressed in a high order of terms, and that
the English words suggest a wealth of analysis and
association altogether foreign to the thoughts that are
to berteproduced. Translation from a lower to a higher
language is a process of elevation. However vigilant
he may be, a writer on Indian philosophy will find it
hard to say neither too much nor too little,—to present
the facts as he finds them without prejudice and with-
out predilection. It is all but impossible to place one¬
self in the position of .the ancient Indian sages,—to see
things as they saw them, and to name them in the
names ;hey gave them. The effort is nothing less than
an endeavour to revert to a ruder type of mental struc¬
ture, to put aside our hereditary culture, and to become
for the time barbarians.
It will he well to bear iij mind the characters of an stationwynnd,
unprogressive as contrasted with the characters of a order con- •
progressive, variety of the human race. These are ten¬
dencies engrained in the nervous system, and transmitted
from generation to generation. They are hereditary,
inborn habitudes, and no one can foresee how fax they
will give way before foreign influences, or be modified
by them. The contrast between the lower and «he
higher human varieties, between the stationary and the
advancing social orders, is instructively set out by the
historian Grata. “ The acquisition of habits of regular
industry, so- fdreign to the natural temper of man, was
brought about in Egypt and Assyria, in China and Hin¬
dustan, before it had acquired any footing in Europe;
but it was purchased either by. prostrate obedience to a
despotic rule, or by imprisonment within the chain of
a consecrated institution of caste. Even during the
Homeric period of Greece these countries had attained a
 6 THE PHILOSOPHY

Cha?. I. certain civilisation in mass, without the acquisition of

any high mental qualities or the development of any
individual genius. The religious and political sanction
determined for every one his mode of life, his creed, his
duties, and his place in society, without leaving any
scope for the will or reason of the agent himself/'
Grote in the next place speaks of the Semitic races,
the Jews, Phoenicians, Carthaginians, of their individual
impulse and energy, as also of their strenuous ferocity
of character, and then contrasts all these races with the
"flexible, many-sided, and self-organising Greek,, not
only capable of opening, both for himself and for the
human race, the highest walks of intellect and the full
creative agency of art, but alsQt gentler by far in his
private sympathies and dealings than his contempo¬
raries on the Euphrates, the Jordan, or the Nile/* And
elsewhere he points out that in* no city of historical
Greece did there prevail either human sacrifices or
ddiberate mutilation, such as cutting off the nose, ears,
hands, feet, and so forth, or castration, or selling of'
children into slavery, or polygamy, or the feeling of
unlimited obedience towards one man; all of these
being customs which might be pointed out as existing
among the contemporary Carthaginians, Egyptians, Per¬
sians*, Thracians, and other peoples.
The Orientalist will have to look in the face this
feet of the inferiority of the hereditary type of Indian
character. His work may he hard and unproductive,
but at least it is necessary to a full and complete survey
of the products of the human mind. He has much to
d° and little to claim as regards the value of his labours,
and he will not demur to the judgment of Archer Butler:
* It presents a'fearful contrast to observe the refine¬
ment to which speculation appears to have been carried
in the philosophy of India, and the grossness of the
contemporary idolatry* paralleled in scarcely any nation
of the earth, as well as the degraded condition of the
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 7

mass of the people, institute of active energy, and for Chap. i.

th^rinost part without; a shadow of moral principle to
animate the dull routine of a burthensome and scru-
piUous superstition. The aim of human wisdom is the
liberation of the soul from the evils attending the mortal
state. This object is attempted by one modification or
other of that intense abstraction which, separating the
soul from the bonds of flesh, is supposed capable of
liberating it in this life from the unworthy restrictions
of earthly existence, and of introducing it in the next
to the full enjoyment of undisturbed Tepose, or even to
the glories of a total absorption into the divine essence
itself. In all this we may detect the secret but1 con¬
tinual influences of a climate which, indisposing the
organisation for active exertion, naturally cherished
those theories which represent the true felicity of man
to consist in inward contemplation and complete quies¬
cence."
A few words must be said about the social state that The social an*
preceded the rise of Indian philosophy. In using the mmhImi
■word philosophy, it is to be taken loosely, as designating'SiS?4"
a large amount of pictorial conception covering an -inner
nucleus of rudimentary ideas. We are dealing with reli¬
gion as well as with metaphysics. In India religion and -
metaphysics have grown up in one promiscuous growth,
and have never had a separate life. They cannot he
disengaged from each other, and we can seldom, point
to such and such an item in any structure as philoso¬
phical, and such and such another item as religious. A
few words only can be given to an explanation of the
social order that preceded the rise of the Brahmanical
and Buddhist forms of thought and faith, and the
reader must refer for further information, if he needs'
it, to the writings of Professor Max Muller and Dr.
John Muir. Let us, then, station ourselves in the- com¬
munities in which the Rishis -lived, the seers that saw
and fashioned the Vedic hymns. The Indian tribes
 8 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. X. have already reached a settled state of order and pros*

perity. They are gathered together in farms, in Jhnts
of sun-dried mud, and houses of stone, in hamlets and
in fenced towns, under village chiefs and Rajas. The
outward aspects of their life are not unlike those of the
rural India of to-day. The same villages, the same
thatched huts of the peasantry, with mud-walled yards
for cattle, and the same square courts and stncooed
garden-houses of the village chiefs and prin'eelets.
There is the same silence, broken only by the creaking
pulleys of the village well and the occasional bark of
village curs, the same green mantle on the stagnant
wayside pools, the same square tank; the sunlight
glinting as to-day through the delicate foliage of the
tamarind, the glossy leaves of the peepul, and the
feathery tufts of the bamboo. There is the same over¬
powering glare upon the surface of the earth, and there
axe the same liquid depths of overarching blue over¬
head, but the horizon is fringed with jungle, and the
levels are grassy and less arid than to-day, for the,
forests are dense and widely spread, and the rainfall is
more abundant. In such surroundings, for the most
part tranquil and dreamlike, but at times terrific with
shocks of tropical storm and rain, the Indians of the
Vedic age till their rice and barley, irrigate their fields
with watercourses, watch the increase of their flocks
and herds, and make a hard or easy livelihood as black¬
smiths, wheelwrights, boat-builders, weavers, leeches,
ftotaiers, poets, priests. They live upon the produce of
theSr and of their fields, drink wine and moon-
P*Wt juice, and exercise their leisure in sacrificial feasts
and in games and spectacles.
tionof«io- The powers of nature present themselves to them as
nteefad
so maay personal agents. Every striking and unex¬
pected change in the things around them is an extfa-
Tkey see God in clouds
and hear him m the wind They imuute their whole
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 9

self to all they see around them, anthropomorphising Chap. L

all-nature. The environment is a divine community,

in the midst of which the human communities have
their life. To use the words of Archer Butler, “ Man’s
early tendencies are constantly leading to a wide and
vague application of his whole nature, to see himself in
everything, to recognise his will, and even his sensa¬
tions, m the inanimate universe. This blind analogy
is almost the first hypothesis of childhood. The child
translates the external world by himself. He perceives,
for example, successions under the law of causality, but
he adds to this causality his own consciousness of
voluntary effort. He perceives objects under the law
of extension, but he has little conception of an exten¬
sion which should overpass his own power of traversing
it. Thechild personifies the stone that hurts him; the
childhood of superstition, whose genius is multiplicity,
personifies the laws of nature as gods; the childhood
of philosophy, whose genius is unity, makes the world
itself a living, breathing animal, whose body nature is,
and God the soul ”
Thus it is that to the communities in which the Risliis
dwell a multitude of personalities manifest themselves,
in rain, in fire, in wind, in storms, and in the sun.
They stand above and round about the people, in
ever-varying aspects, powerful to befriend or to injure
them.
Sky and Earth are the father and mother of gods
and men. Aditi, the illimitable expanse, is the mother
of chiefs and heroes. Mitra, presiding over the day,
wakes men and bids them bestir themselves betimes,
and stands watching all things with unwinking eye.
Varuna, ruling the night, prepares a cool place of rest
for all that move, fashions a pathway for the sun, sends
his spies abroad in both the worlds, knows every wink
of men’s eyes, cherishes truth and hates a lie, seizes the
evil-doer with his noose, and is prayed to to have mercy
 10 TUB PHILOSOPHY

I. oa the sinful. Youthful, lustrous, and beautiful, the

Chap.
Alvins go out in their golden car before the dawn, ith
'health and wealth for man. Ushas, the Dawn, the
daughter of the sky, untouched with age, but . bringing
age to men, dispels the darkness, drives away the
lurking enemy, visits every house, wakes the sleepers,
sends the labourers afield, and makes' the birds to fly
aloft. Agrii, the fire-god, of manifold birth, t e off¬
spring of the fire-drills, fed with sacrificial butter, bears
the oblation aloft to the gods, brings the gods to the
sacrifice, and is generally internunciary between, gods
and men. Surya, the sun-god, proceeds through the
sky in his chariot with seven mares, seeing all things,
looking down upon the good and evil works of men..
Indra, ruling the firmament, overthrows Vritra, the
enemy that obscures the brightness of the sky, splits
up the clouds with his thunderbolt, sends down the
rain upon the earth, restores the sun to the heavens,
protects the Aryan colour, and destroys the dark and
degraded Dasyus, godless, prayerless, uninformed of
Bacrificial rites. Parjanya, the thunderer, scatters
showers from his waterskin, and fills the earth and sky
with fatness. “The winds blow, the lightnings play,
plants spring Up, the sky fructifies, the glebe teems
fur the good of all, as Parjanya visits the earth with
moisture.” The Maruts, the personified dust-storms,
armed with lightnings, clothed with rain, make dark-
ness in the day, water the earth, and mitigate the heat.
Soma, the mountain milk-weed, invigorates the gods,
exhilarates mankind, clothes' the naked, heals the sick,
gives eyes to the blind. With Yama, the regent of the
dead, the departed dwell in happiness with the fore¬
fathers of their tribes.
These and many others are the luminous beings that
j^g««*»^and around them, and require to be flattered with
• hymnvto be fed with butter, to be refreshed with
soma-juice, that they .may become friendly and fatherly.
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 21

$nd may send rain, food, cattle, children, and length of ciur
davs to their worshippers. As yet these worshippers
feel themselves at one with the things around them-;
roused to work or fight in the glare and heat of the
long bright day, by the freshness of the dawn and
the harsh notes of tropical birds: resting as best they
may in the starlit night, seldom silent, for the most
part resonant with monotonous croakings from the
marsh* shrill with the crickets on grass and plant and
tree, and not without peril from the violence of prowling
savages from the adjacent jungle. There is little of
moral or spiritual significance in this propitiation of
the forces of nature. A sinner is for the most part
nothing else than a man that fails to pay praise, and
prayer, and sacrifice to the deities, often only the dark<
skinned savage that infests the Indo-Arian villag&T
The good man is he that flatters, feeds, and wins
favour of the gods.
BQpa deoirs TeiOei, SQp1 alSotovs pcuriXyar,

The gods eat the oblations, giving in return the good

things of life, rain to the arid fields, food, cattle, chariots,
wealth, children, health, a hundred years of life. Life
is as yet no burden to them; there is nothing of .the
blank despair that came in later with the tenet of
metempsychosis and the misery of every form of sen¬
tient life. Pleasures are looked for in this world; land
is to be had for the conquest; their harvests are enough
for the wants of all; their flocks and herds are many;
and pleasures are looked for again in the after-life in
the body in the kingdom of Yama. As among other
undeveloped.races, the sacrifices are offered as propitia¬
tory presents, as compensations for liturgic errors, and,
as the necessary subsistence of the gods that enables
them to watch over the well-being of mankind. This is
the persuasion that prevailed into later times, and thus
it appears in the Bhagavadgita: “ Prajapati of old
 12 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap, l created beings with their rites of sacrifice, and said.

Hereby shall you propagate yourselves: this shall be to
you the cow of plenty. Sustain with this the gods,
and let the gods sustain you: supporting each other in
turn, you shall attain the highest happiness. Fed with
sacrifice, the gods shall give you the food that you
desire. He that gives them nothing and eacs the food
they give, is a thief indeed. The good who oat the
leavings of the sacrifice are loosed from their guilt, but
they that cook for themselves alone, and not for the
gods, eat sin. Living things are made of food; the food
proceeds from rain; the rain proceeds from sacrifice.”
TBeVedicwor- This worship of the personified powers of nature
with a view to material benefits gradually hardened
into a series of rites to be performed by the priest¬
hood. Each sacrifice came to operate in a blind and
mechanic way towards the production of a specified
result. The sequence of the fruit upon the performance
of the function presented itself as part of the fixed suc¬
cession of events. Minute rules were framed for every
step of the sacrificial procedures, and explanations in¬
vented to give to every implement and every act its
several symbolic import. Expiatory formulas were
provided to make up for inadvertences and omis¬
sions which might otherwise frustrate the purposes of
the initiated votary and the priestly experts he em¬
ployed. In this process lies the transition from the
religion of the Mantras, the hymns, the spontaneous
effusions of the primitive seers or Bishis, to the religion
of the Braknnmas, the petrified ceremonial and formal'
symbolism of the liturgists. This later form of Yedic
religion received the name of the Karmakanda, or ritual
department of the Vedas. In the course of time ;it
came to be held that the sacrifices performed without
knowledge of their theologic import produced their
desired' effect—some material good, the birth of children,
the prolongation of life, a series of successes in tribal
 OF THE UPASISHADS. >3

feuds, and the like; leading the worshipper at the Chap.x.

higflest by the lunar path to a sojourn in the paradise
of the deities, to be followed by a return to- a fresh
embodiment. Performed with proper insight into their
theologic significance, they raised the votary after death
along the solar path into the mapsion of the supreme
divinity, the sphere of Brahma, there to reside till the
close oi the passing eon.
But in the midst of this life of the primitive Hindu pint begin-
in communion with the gods of nature, there are dis- moSgcspecu.
cernible the first stirrings of reflection. Questions vedu! bymua.
begin to be asked in the hymns of the Bisbis in regard
to the origin of earth and sky. Sometimes they said
they were made by the gods, or by one or other of the
gods, working after the fashion of a human artificer.
At other times they said the gods begot them. One of
the Bisbis asks about the earth and sky, “Which of
these was first, and which was later ? You wise, which
of you knows ? ” Another asks, “ What was the forest,
what the tree, they cut the sky and earth out of, that
abide and wear not out, while the days and many dawns
have worn away ? ”1 In one hymn earth and sky are
the work of Vi^vakarinan. In another it is Hiranya-
gar'bha, the Golden Germ, that arose in the 'beginning,
the lord of things that are, that establishes the sky and
the earth, that is the giver of life and breath. In
another it is Varuita, either alone or associated with
Mitra, who fixes the heavens, measures out the earth,
pad dwells as ruler in all the worlds. AgDi is some¬
times the son of Barth and Sky; at other times, he
is said to have stretched out the earth and sky, to
have inlaid the sky with stars, and to have made all
that flies, or walks, or stands, or mores. In other
1 Rigveda x. 31, 7. The ques- was the forest, Self the tree from
turn is answered in the Taittiriya- which they cut out the earth and
br&hmana iL 8, 9: Brahman--the sky. See Muir’s Sanskrit Texts,
Self that permeates and vitalises voL v. p. 32.
all things and all forms of life—
 H TIIE PHILOSOPHY.

Chat, l places it is Tndra that has begotten the sun, the sky,
— the dawn; that has set up lights in the skyy th&t up¬
holds the two worlds, the waters, the plains, thd hills,
and the sky.
“ Whafc poet now, what sage of old,
The greatness of that god hath told,
Who from his body ^ast gave birth
To father sky and mother earth 'I
Who hung the heavens in empty space,
And gave the earth a stable base,
Who framed and. lighted up the sun,
And made a path for him to run.”1

Elsewhere it is Soma, the desified moon-plant, that

generates the earth and sky, that puts light into the
sun, and stretches out the atmosphere. In another
hymn Aditi, the endless visible expanse, is all that is;
u Aditi is sky, Aditi is air, Aditi is mother, father, son,
Aditi is all the gods, and is thfc five tribes of men,
Aditi is whatever has been born* Aditi is' whatever
shall be born.” The five tribes of men are the Brah¬
mans, Kshatriyas, and Vaiiiyas, the priestly, military,
and agricultural orders, more or less of Aryan extrac¬
tion, the ^udras, or indigenous serfs and slaves grafted
into the Hindu communities, and the Nishadpts, or tribes
of unreclaimed barbarians outside the Hindu pale.
In Rigveda x. 72, 2 we read: “ Brahma^aspati has
forged these births of the gods, as a blacksmith fans his
flame: in the primal age of the gods entity came forth
out of nonentity.”
Iu ^he Purusliasukta, Rigveda x. 99, the world 29
made,;—the Bik, the Saman, and the Yajush, the three
Yedic aggregates, the Brahman, Rgjanya, Yai«ya, and
Sudra* the four orders of people in the Hindu pale, are
produced,—rout of purusba, the highest deity, the per¬
sonality that permeates all living things, offered up by
the gods, the Sad^yasjand the I&shis, as a sacrificial
* iU&tr a Metrical Translations from.Sangkjit Writers, p. 173.
 OF THE VPA NISHA DS. IS

victim. Here the idea of the emanation of the "world chap, x,

from a divine spirit internal to all embodied sentiencies
is presented in a form gross, obscure, and almost unin¬
telligible to the modern mind. “ Purusha has a thousand
heads, a thousand eyes, a thousand feet. He compasses
the earth on every side, and stands ten fingers’ breadth
beyond. Purusha is all this; he is that which has been,
and that which is to be: the lord also of immortality, '
and thd lord of that which grows up with food. Such
is his greatness, and Purusha is more than this: one
quarter of him is all existing things, three-quarters that
which is immortal in the sky.” It will be hereafter
necessary to return to this hymn, as it contains a por¬
tion of the mythologic imagery of the subsequent Yedic
philosophy of the Upanishads, and to exhibit its natural
interpretation in accordance with that philosophy by
Sayana, or, as he is otherwise known, the schoolman
Madhavacharya.
Meanwhile, to proceed to another hymn. The efifu-TheKjswjiy*
sions of atvaken.. g. reflection reach their highest energy
in the celebrated Nasadlyasukta, Bigveda X. 129. It is
in this hymn that is first suggested the primitive type-
of Indian thought, the thesis of all the Upanishads,
yiz., the emanation of the world and of all the forms of
life that successively people it, out of the sole reality,
the Self that permeates and vitalises all things, through
the agency of the unreality that overspreads it, the self-
feigned fiction, the eosmical illusion, Maya. “ It was
not entity, nor was it nonentity," says the Bishi. The
Cosmical illusion neither is nor is not; it is a self-feigned
fiction, a spurious semblance of being, for it is Self
alone- that is. And yet it is not merely nothing, for
then the world of experience would not be here and
everywhere, for living souls to pass through. “ Ho air
was then, no sky above.” In the state of. things in
Which the various spheres of experience and the sen¬
tient -lives that inherit them have not yet reappeared1
 16 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. I.
from tlieir last disappearance into the fontal, spiritual
essence, in the infinite series of aeons, there is as yet
nothing thinkable, nothing nameablc. “ "What shrouded
all ? where ? in the receptacle of what ? Was it wate ,
the unfathomable abyss ? ” Water, be it noted, became
in the later philosophy of the Brahmans one of the
many names of the inexplicable principle of unreality,
the world-fiction. “Death was not then, nor immor5
tality.” These are things that have no meaning in the
sole life of the undifferenced Self. “ There was no dis¬
tinction of day or night. That One breathed without
afflation, self-determined: other than, and beyond itv
there was naught” This one, the all, is the sole reality,
the aboriginal essence, the undifferenoed Self, the Brah¬
man or Atman of the later Hindu quietist. ,f Darkness
there was, wrapped up in darkness. All this was ui»*
differenced water. That one that was void, covered with
nothingness, developed itself by the power of srif-
torture. Desire first rose in it, the primal germ: this
sages seeking with the intellect have found in the heart
to be the tie of entity to nonentity.” The Self in its
earliest connection with the cosmical illusion becomes
the creative spirit, the Mvara of the philosophy of the
TJpanishads. The creative spirit is said in the Tajttirlya
Upanishadto perform self-torture, to coerce itself, as
the scholiasts say, to rigorous contemplation, to a ptr
vision of the world that is to be, and this prevision H
its desire to project the spheres, and to part itself illu¬
sively into all the innumerable forms of. life that are
to pass through them. “ The ray stretohed out across
these, was it above or was it below? There were gene¬
rating forces, there were mighty powers; a self-deter¬
mined being on this side, an energy beyond. Who
indeed knows? who can say out of what it issued,
whence this ereation? The gods are on this side of its
evolution: who then knows out of what it came into
existence? This creation, whether any made it. or-
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 17

any made it not ? He that is the overseer in the highest chap, l

heaven, he indeed knows, or haply he knows not”
Thus there is in the Yedic hymns a second line of Thehymwor
movement, and this leads us to the primitive type of up to
Itrdian philosophy as it develops itself in tlie TTpani-
shads. The hymns made in generation after generation
by the ftishis, fashioned by them as a car is fashioned
by a wheelwright, or fabricated or generated by the
gods, were transmitted by memory from age to age, till
they became of inscrutable origin and authority, of no
mere personal authorship, but timeless revelations com¬
ing forth afresh in each successive aeon. The period of
the hymns or Mantras was followed, as has been seen,
by the period of the ritual and legendary compilations
known as the Brahmanas. Of these Brahmanas, parti¬
cular portions, to be repeated only by the recluses of
the forest, were styled Aranyakas, and to the Araiiyakas
Were attached the treatises setting forth as a hidden
wisdom the fictitious nature of the religion of rites as
ptfrt and parcel of the series of mere semblances, the
Wndd-phantasmagory, and the sole reality of the all-
pervading, tod all-animating Self, or Brahman. This
hidden wisdom, tne pnilosophy of* the Upanishads, in
contradistinction from the Karmakanda or ritual por¬
tion, received the name of Jfutnakau<Ja, or gnostic por¬
tion, of the $ruti, or everlasting revelation. There were
HOW virtually two religions, the* Karmamarga, or path
of rites, for the people of the villages, living as if life
with its pleasures and pains were real, and the Jfiana-
marga, or path of knowledge, for the sages that had
quitted the world and sought the quiet of the jungle,
renouncing the false ends and empty fictions of Com¬
mon life, and intent upon reunion with the sole reklitv,
the Self that is one in all tilings Jiving.
: After this brief notice of the period that preceded oiimatb* eth-
the rise of philosophy in India, it-will be necessaiy, in reu&owdege-
the second place, to point out certain modifications of Hindu pj* *
 IS THE PHILOSOPHY

Oku. i. the primitive forma of faith, which followed the clima-

tic degeneration of the Indo-Arian tribes, and the de¬
gradation of the race through intermixture with and
assimilation to the melanous indigenes.
The worship of Siva or Mahadeva is towards the
JrptojY.iin. close of this period introduced from the mountains of
the north, the new deity being identified with the
Budra of the Yedic poets, the howling god of tempests,
the father of the Maruts, In Hindu mythology Siva
often appears as the divine pattern of the fasting
devotee, intent upon the attainment of ecstatic and
magical powers through savage self-torture and self-
induced vacuity, apathy, and trance. Iu this character
he is the lord of Yogins, the great typical asoetic, living
in the solitude of forest and. mountain, sitting motion¬
less, with matted hair and body smeared with ashes,
with breath suppressed, with vision withdrawn from
all outward things, with every thought and feeling
crushed within him. The practice of self-torture is
alien to the cheerful spirit of the Vedic worshipper,
aspiring to health and wealth and length of days,
an after-life in the realms of Yama amidst the fore-
fathers of mankind. It was from the semirsavage
- - - * races, with which they were coalescing, and whlfth they
Yog*.
were elevating, that they now adopted the practice of
fixmg the body and the limbs in statue-lika repose,
and inducing cataleptic igidity and insensibility,
rnghor state than the normal state of human life^ftit
practice known as Yoga,—union, ecstasy, the melting
f*?y of r® ?«■«»«»*■ into a state of characterless
rn^termmation. The process seems to be accompanied
with intervals of morbid nervous and cerebral exalte
t«»v m which tiie self-torturer loses all distinction
“* tactic,, and appears to
tamedf and often to be toveetod with superhuman
I»Wew. He becomes enabled to raise up the fore-
fathers of the tribes before him by a mere act of will'
 OF THE UPANISHA DS. *9

to animate a plurality of bodies at the same time, to chat. j.

cdnfrcl the elements, to walk through the air, to enter “
into the earth with the same ease as into water, to
remain unhurt in fire, dry in water, and eo forth.
“Among the lower races, and high above their level,
morbid ecstasy, brought on by meditation, fasting, nar¬
cotics, excitement, or disease, is a state common and
held in honour among the very classes -specially con¬
cerned with mythic idealism."1 “ Throughout the
lower civilisation men believe, with the most vivid and
intense belief, in the objective reality of the human
spectres which they see in sickness or exhaustion,
under the-influence of mental excitement or of narcotic
drugs. One main reason of the practices of fasting,
penance, narcotising, and other means of bringing on
morbid exaltation, is that the patients may obtain the
sight of spectral beings, from whom they look to gain
spiritual knowledge, and even worldly power.” 2
To the close rif this period also, and through inter- serini of
mixture with the ruder indigenes, may probably be ^ow*bun*'
referred the revival of the ancient rite of burning the
widow upon the funeral pile together with the corpse
of the husband. The actual incremation formed no
part ot the ancient Yedic ritual, which directs that the
widow placed upon the pile by the side of the
deceased husband, and then down again by the
ther-inrbtw, by an adopted S6U,-or by an old servant,
and hidden-to return to the living world. The bow, or
the sacrificial implements of the deceased, are to be burnt
together with the corpse. The fact that the widow
thus ascended the pile is taken by Mr. Tylor to indi¬
cate the actual practice of the immolation of widows
before the Yedic age,, a practice that outlived thr pre¬
cept for its suppression, and came to a public revival
-under later influences. With climatic degeneration,
and with degradation through absorption of semi-savage
1 Tylor’s Primitive Culture, voL i. p. 277. 2 Ibid., 402,-
 20 THE PHILOSOPHY

chap . j. blood, probably came the relapse into the primitive

— Aryan rite of widow-sacrifice. Funeral human sacrifice
was a general rite of the Aryan nations while yet in a
rude and barbarous oondititin. " The episodes of t£e
Trojan captives laid with the horses and hounds on the
funeral pile of Patroklos, and of Evadne throwing her¬
self into the funeral pile of her husband, and Pausanias’
narrative of the suioide of the three Messenian widows,
are among its Greek representatives. In Scandinavian
myth Baldr is burnt with his dwarf foot-page, his
horse, and saddle: Brynliild lies on. the pile by her
.beloved Sigurd, and men and maids follow after them
on the hell-way. Old mentions of Slavonic heathendom
describe the burning of the dead with clothing and wea¬
pons, horses and hounds, and, above all, with wives.”1
poiyindry. Other marks of degradation are the polyandry of
Draupadl, the fierce blood-thirst of Bhlma, and other
savage incidents in the Mabgbharata. Polyandry is one
of the usages of the ruder races the Indo-Arians en¬
croached upon, and received as serfs, as subjects, and
as neighbours, prevailing in Tibet, in the Himalayan
and sub-Himalayan regions under Tibetan influence, in
the valley of Kashmir, and in the far south of the
peninsula among the Tudas of the Nllgiri hills, the
Coorgs of Mysore, and the Nayars of Malabar.
Bdiefa in the But of all the marks of this degradation of national
SfSSTtnd type, the most noteworthy is the growing belief in me-
2SJtempsychosis, and the assertion of the misery of every
form of sentient life,—a belief and assertion with which
later Indian literature is replete to saturation. It is
this expectation of a renewal of a life of misery in body
afteT body, in age after age, and aeon after tson, and the
feverish yearning after some means of extrication from
this Hack prospect, that is, as will be seen, the first
motive to Indian speculation. The sum and substance,
it may almost be said, of Indian philosophy, is from
1 Primitive Culture, vol. i. p. 419.
 OF THE UPA NISH. A DS. SI

first to last the misery of metempsychosis, and the chap, i,

mode, of extrication from it. Of this fact the student

of Indian philosophy should never for a moment lose
sight, or he will lose his way in what will then seem to
him a pathless jungle of abstractions.
The doctrine of transmigration formed no part of the
faith of the earlier Yedie worshipper. The ancient
poets had looked forward to a second life in the body,
among the fathers of their tribes, and. in the realms of
Yama. As to punishments in a future state they are
silent. In the later period of Yedie religion,3 the period
of petrified forms already referred to, a passage of the
Satapathabrahmana relates how Bhrigu, the son of
Yaruna, visiting the four uttermost parts of the world,
saw men cut into pieces and eaten by others. -The
eaters bwing asked the meaning of this by Bhrigu, said
that the} were revenging upon their victims the wrongs
they had suffered at their hands in the former world.
This marks the first beginning of the expectation of
pend retribution in a future state of being. The doc¬
trine of metempsychosis, a belief widely spread among
the lower races of men, coining slowly and surely to
lay hold of the Hindu mind, this penal retribution
came to be expected in a series of embodiments in
vegetal, animal, human, and extra-human shapes. Each
living soul was to pass from body to body, from grade
to grade, from sphere to sphere of life, in obedience to
a retributive operation by which suffering followed
evil-doing with the blind and fatal movement of a
natural law. As the life has been, such will the next
embodiment be in the series of lives, the present and
the future with their pains and transitory pleasures
being the outcome of what the soul has done in its
anterior embodiments. Hie series of lives has had no
beginning, and shall have no end, save to the perfected
sage finally resolved into the fontal essence of the uni-
1 See Muir’s Sanskrit Texts vol. v. p. 322, .
 52 YHE PHILOSOPHY

Catr. t verse. A life of such and such experiences follows

from works of suck and such a nature, good works
sending the soul upwards in the scale of embodiments
into a life human, superhuman, or divine, and evil
works sending the soul downwards into bestial, insect,
vegetal, pend; embodiments in this world, or in a
nether world of torture. In this world, above, below
there is no place of rest; paradises and purgatories are
but stages in the endless journey. In every state there
is nothing to expect hut vanity, vexation, and misery.
Omnis ereatura ingemiscit. There is nothing to look for
but grief and pain, broken at best with pleasures them¬
selves fleeting, empty, and unsatisfying: nothing to
look for but sickness, decay, the loss of loved ones,
death, and the fatal recurrence of fresh; birth, through
au endless succession of embodiments. Each present
suffering, intolerable as it is, is the precursor to another
and another, through lives without end. The very
. Votrtn help merit that wins a sojourn in a paradise or the rank of
pana divinity must sooner or later be exhausted, for the
<U**" bankrupt soul to descend to a lower sphere. The plea¬
sures of the paradise themselves are tainted with the
fear of their expiry, and with the inequalities of the
inmates of the paradise.
“ The happier state
In heaven, which follows dignity, might draw
Envy froth each inferior.”

The soul floats helpless along the stream of lives, like

a gourd on the surface of a river. A stream of lives,
wave upon wave—
“ Labitur et labetur in omhe volubilis aevum.”
There is now no longer for the Hindu the cheering
prospect of an after-life with his fathers, but the dreary
vista lies before him of death after death, to be bom
that he may suffer and may die,-to be bom again that
he may suffer and may die again, and this tp endless
*ges»—to die tfnd go he knows not whither, perhaps
 OF THE VPANISHADS. 23

into an ephemeral insect life, perhaps into penal fire, j.

perhaps into a higher life, but every life alike transitory,
and with another death beyond it A fitting concomi¬
tant to the practice of savage self-torture is this belief
of metempsychosis, with its attendant horror and de¬
spair. “ The rich, their children round them, are filled The intoie*.
with anguish at the hour of death, and like theirs is the ofufe*S8?rt
Sorrow of those in a paradise upon the expiry of their
merits. At the hour of death, great is the anguish of a
thriving prince, and like ,his is the sorrow of those in a
paradise upon the expiry of their merits. In the para¬
dise itself they are dependent, and cannot help them¬
selves. The sorrow of the celestial sojourners at the
loss of their merits, is like the sorrow of the rich at the
loss of their riches. In the performance of rites there
is pain, in the fruition of the recompense of those rites
there is pain, upon the expiry of the recompense there
irthe direful pain of fresh birth into the world. For
what shall the living soul pass iuto on its return from
paradise ? shall it pass into a high, & middle, or a low -
embodiment, or shall it be born into a place of punish¬
ment?”1 The series of lives -of misery is without
beginning no less than without end, and no one knows
what he has done in the far past and laid up for the
future. Birth from works and fresh works from new
birth, as plant from seed and seed from plant, and who
shall assign the priority to either ? In the.never-ceas-
ing onward flow of things there is no longer anything
more than a seeming perpetuity for the gods themselves,
and many thousand Indras are said to have passed
away as scon has followed aeon. The Hindu looks to
the flow of lives through which he has passed, to the
flow of lives through wliich he has to pass, till he can
find no fixity or stability in any kind of world. All
things are passing, and'passing away; and what re¬
mains ? anything or nothing ? Here we have, as will
1 Atmapurana xvi. 91-95.
 u THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap,l be shortly seen, the first point of transition to the

metaphysical era. Something must be found that shall
be fixed and changeless in the midst of all this change;
some place of rest must be provided to limit this vist
of restless misery and migration.
In the TTpanishads the tenet of transmigration is
already conspicuous. Thus in the Chhandogya we
read: “"Whatever these creatures are in this world*
lion, or wolf, or boar, or worm, or moth, or gAat, or
mosquito, that they become again and again.” And
again: “ Those whose life has been good will quickly
attain a new embodiment—embodiment as a Brahman,
a Kskatriya, or a Vai^ya. Those whosb life has been
evil will quickly pass into an evil embodiment—em¬
bodiment as a dog, or a hog, or a Chandala.” In the
post-Vedic literature the nature of the retributive em¬
bodiments is treated of in minute and fanciful detail.
Thus, in the twelfth book of the laws of the Manavas,
it is said: “ The greatest sinners, after passing through
terrible regions of torture for long periods of years, pass
into the following embodiments: The slayer of a Brah-
man enters into the body of a dog, a boar, an ass, a
camel, a bull, a goat, a sheep, a stag, a bird, a Chandala,
or a Pukkaia, according to the proportion of his guilt;
a Brahman that drinks strong drinks shall enter into
the body of a worm, an insect, a moth, of a fly that
feeds on ordure,, or of a noxious animal A thievish
Brahman shall pass thousands of times into the bodies
of spiders, snakes, chameleons, crocodiles, and of malig¬
nant vampires.”1 And then follows a long series of
other penal states of life, proportioned to the guilt of
the agents that are to pass through them.
^r* Tyl°r2 has shown how widely the belief has
£££££?* prevailed among semi-savage tribes, of the passage of
*«[£«•<* the human soul into the truuks of trees and the bodies
x MSnavadharmas&stra xii. 54, aqq.
4 Primitive Culture, vol. ii, pp. 6, sqq.
 OF THE UPA NISHA DS, 25

of animals. The Sonthals are said to believe the souls chap, l

of the good to enter into fruit-bearing trees. The
Powhattans believed the souls of their chiefs to pass
in 0 particular wood-birds, which they therefore spared.
The Tlascalans of Mexico thought that the souls of
their nobles migrated after death into beautiful singing-
birds, and the spirits of plebeians into beetles, weasels,
ana other insignificant creatures. The Zulus of South
Africa are said to believe the passage of the dead into
snakes, or into wasps and lizards. The Dayaks of
Borneo imagine themselves to find the souls of the
dead, clamp and bloodlike, in the trunks of trees. The
belief in the passage of the soul into trees, and animals,
and fresh human bodies having no place in Yedic
literature prior to the Upanishads, it is reasonable to
suppose the Hindus to have taken it from the indi¬
genes, in the course of their absorption of indigenous
blood.
It is well known that metempsychosis was one of current in
the beliefs of the ancient Egyptians in regard to the SKnanMT
destination of the soul. The tenet connects itself with
a belief in the fore- as well as the after-life of the25?SSS^
sentient and thinking principle. From the Egyptians
it is adopted at intervals into the Greek philosophy.
It first appears in the teaching of Pythagoras, Empe¬
docles fancies that the blood he has shed in an earlier
form of life is crying out against him in this, and that
he is to be a fugitive and a wanderer upon the earth
for thirty thousand years. Exiled from the presence
of the gods, divine though it be, his soul is to pass
through a succession of penal embodiments, until it
regains its purity. It is to enter into the shapes of
plants and trees, of fishes and birds, and other animals,
some of these shapes being higher than others, as the
laurel among trees, the lion among the beasts. From
the Pythagoreans the doctrine is taken up by Plato,
as in unison with his belief of the pre-existence and
 36 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. L post-existence of the soul, and as explanatory of the in¬

Philosophy equalities of human fortune. Thus in the Phsedpp:—
the release
from metem
“Are we to suppose, says Socrates, that the soul,
T*vch< »sia in
the Pluedon.
an invisible thing, in going to a place like itself, in¬
visible, pure, and noble, the true Hades, into the
presence pf the good and wise God, whither, if God
will, my soul is also soon to go,-—that the soul, I say,
if this be her nature and origin, is blown away and
perishes immediately on quitting the body, as thfe many
say ? It is far otherwise, my dear Simmias and Cebes.
The truth is much more this, that if the soul is pure at
its departure, it drags after it nothing bodily, in that it
has never, of its own will, had connection with the
body in its life, but has always shunned it, and gathered
itself unto itself; for this avoidance of the body has
been its constant practice. And this is nothing else
than that it philosophises truly, and practises how to
die with ease* And is not philosophy the practice of
death ?
“ Certainly.
“ That soul, I say, itself invisible, departs to a world
invisible like itself—to the divine, and immortal, and
rational. Arriving there, its lot is to be happy, released
from human error and unwisdom, fears, and wild pas¬
sions, and all other, human ills, and it dwells for all
future time, as they say of the initiated, in the society of
the gods. Shall we say this, Cebes, or say otherwise ?
“ It is so, said Cebes, beyond a doubt.
“ But do you think the soul will depart in perfect
purity if it is polluted and impure at the time it quits
the body, as having always been the companion and
servant of the body, in love with and fascinated by it,
f*nd by the bodily desires and pleasures, until it conies
to think that nothing is true but that which has a
bodily shape, which a man may touch, and see, and
eat^ and drink, and gratify his sensuality upon; and if,
at the same time, it has been accustomed to hate, and
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 27

fear, and shun the intelligible world, which is dark and Cbat. L
invisible to the bodily eye, and can be attained only by
philosophy ?
“ It cannot possibly, he replied.
“ It is engrossed by the corporeal, which the continual
companionship with the body, and constant attention to
it, have made natural to it.
“ Very true.
“ And this, my friend, may be conceived to be that
ponderous, heavy, earthy element of sight, by which
such a soul is weighted* and dragged down again into
the visible world, because it is afraid of the invisible
and of the world below, and prowls about tombs and
sepulchres, in the neighbourhood of which certain
shadowy apparitions of'souls have been seen, souls
which hsrve not departed clean and pure, but still hold
by the things of sight, and are therefore seen them¬
selves.
“ That is likely enough, Socrates.
“ Indeed it is likely, Cebes; and these must be the
souls, not of the good, but of the evil, who are necessi¬
tated to haunt such places in expiation of their former
evil way of life; and they continue to wander until the
desire of the bodily element which still cleaves to them
is gratified, and they are imprisoned in another body.
And they are then most likely tied to the same natures
which they have made habitual to themselves in their
former-life.
“ What natures do you mean, Socrates ?
“ I mean to say that men who have followed after
gluttony, and wantonness, and drunkenness, and have
had no thought of avoiding them, would put on the
shape of asses and animals of that sort. What do you
think ?
“ What you say is exceedingly probable.
"And those who have preferred the portion of injus¬
tice, and tyranny, and violence will put on the shape
 28 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. i. of 'wolves, or hawks and kites; or where else should

we say that they would go ?
“ No doubt, said Cebes, they pass into shapes such
as those.
“ And it is pretty plain, he said, into what bodies
each of the rest would go, according to the similitude
of the lives that they have led.
“ That is plain enough, he said.
“ Even among them some are happier than others;
and the happiest in themselves and in the place they
migrate to, are those who have practised the social and
civil virtues that men call temperance and justice,
which are acquired by habit and exercise, without
philosophy and reflection.
“Why Me they the happiest ?
“ Because they will be likely to pass into sorae gentle
social nature like their own, such as that of bees or
abtR, or even back again into the form of man, and
moderate men would spring from them.
"That is possible.
“ But hone but he who is a philosopher or lover of
learhing, and altogether clean and pure at departing, is
permitted to reach the gods.”
In this place Plato approaches more nearly than in
any other passage in his Dialogues to the Oriental tenets
of the migration of the soul from body to body, and the
sole efficiency of supersensible thinking in disengaging
the sOul from these successive lives of sense. For
Socrates, in the Phasdon, it is philosophy alone that
can purify the soul, detach it from the body, and lift
it up into communion with the eternal and unchanging
archetypes. But the Platonic abstraction is a contem¬
plation of the eternal ideas, the patterns after which
the visible world was moulded, the universal verities
discernible through the things of sense; not a Hindu
meditation on formless being, on the characterless Self,
nor a Buddhist meditation on the vacuity into which
 OF THE UPANISHADS. <29

all things are resolvable; and the Platonic after-life of chap. i.

the f ee intelligence is a positive exercise of intellec-
tion, neither a Hindu absorption into the fontal essence,
nor a Buddhist extinction into the aboriginal nothing¬
ness of things.
The thesis of universal misery is a natural sequel'A»utie and
of the doctrine of the migration of the soul. In his
Dialogues concerning Natural Eeligion, Hume has
painted for us the miseries of life in dark colours, but
these are not nearly dark enough for the Hindu. For
him, the miseries of his present life, hunger, thirst, and
faintness, weariness, care, sickness, bereavement, dying
pangs, are to repeat themselves in life after life, and
death after death, in endless iteration. The morbid
reverie of the hypochondriac is gaiety by the side of
this Indian pessimism, and this pessimism is the ever¬
present thought, the very motive power of Indian
speculation.
“ The whole earth, believe me, Philo, is cursed and pol- Hume-a^ie-
luted. A perpetual war is kindled amongst all living miseries <S
creatures. Necessity, hunger, want, stimulate the strong l'f*‘
and courageous; fear, anxiety, terror, agitate the weak
and infirm. The first entrance into life gives anguish
to the new-born infant and to its wretched parent:
weakness, impotence, distress, attend each stage of that
life; and it is at last finished in agony and horror.
“ Observe too, says Philo, the curious artifices of
nature in order to embitter the life of every living
being. The stronger prey upon the weaker, and keep
them in perpetual terror and anxiety. The weaker,
too, in their turn, often prey upon the stronger, and
vex and molest them without relaxation. Consider
that innumerable race of insects, which either are bred
on the body of each animal, or, flying about, infix their
stings in him. These insects have others still less than
themselves which torment them. And thus, on each
hand, before and behind, above and below, every ani-
 3° THE PHILOSOPHY

Chat. i. mai is surrounded with enemies, which incessantly seek

his misery and destruction.
“ Man alone, said Demea, seems to be an exception
to this rule. For, by combination in society, he can
easily master lions, tigers, and bears, whose greater
strength and agility naturally enable them to prey
upon him.
On the contrary, it is here chiefly, cried Philo, that
the uniform and equal maxims of nature are most ap¬
parent Man, it is true, can by combination surmount
all his real enemies, and become master of. the whole
animal creation; but does he not immediately raise up
to himself imaginary enemies, the demons of his fancy,
who 1 .aunt him with superstitious terrors and blast every
enjoyment of life? His pleasure, as he imagines, be¬
comes in their eyes a crime; his food and repose give
them umbrage and offence; his very sleep and dreams
furnish new materials to anxious fear; and even death,
his refuge from every other ill, presents only the dread
of endless and innumerable woes. Nor does the wolf
molest more the timid flock, than superstition does the
anxious breast of wretched mortals.
“ Besides, consider, Demea, this very society by which
we surmount those wild beasts, our natural enemies,
what new enemies does it not raise to us ? what woe
and misery does it not occasion ? Man is the greatest
enemy of man. Oppression, injustice, contempt, con¬
tumely, violence, sedition, war, calumny, treachery,
fraud; by these they mutually torment each other, and
they would soon dissolve that society which they had
formed, were it not for the dread of still greater ills
which must attend their separation.
“But though these external insults, said Demea,
from animals, .from men, from all the elements which
assault us, form a frightful catalogue of woes, they are
nothing in comparison of those which arise within our¬
selves, from the distempered condition of our liiind and
 OF THE UPA NISHADS, 3i

tody. How many lie under the lingering torment of chjlp. t.

diseases ? Hear the pathetic enumeration of the great

poet—
* Intestine stone and ulcer, colic pangs,
Demoniac frenzy, moping melancholy,
And moonstruck madness, pining atrophy,
Marasmus, and wide-wasting pestilence.
Dire was the tossing, deep the groans: Despair
* Tended the sick, busiest from couch to couch.
And over them triumphant Death his dart
Shook, but delayed to strike, though oft invoked
With vows, as their chief good and final hope.*

“The disorders of the mind, continued Demea,

though more secret, are not perhaps less dismal and
vexatious. Demorse, shame, anguish, rage, disappoint¬
ment, atfcciety, fear, dejection, despair; who has ever
passed .through, life without cruel inroads from these
tormentors ? How many have scarcely ever felt any
better sensations ? Labour anu poverty, so abhorred by
every.one, are the certain lot of the far greater number;
and those few privileged persons who enjoy ease and
opulence, never reach contentment or true felicity. AU
the goods of life united would not make a very happy
man, but all the ills united would make a wretch indeed;
and any one of them almost (and who can be free from
every one ?), nay, often the absence of one good (and who
can possess all?) is sufficient to render life ineligible.
“ Were a stranger to drop on a sudden into this world,
I would show him, as a specimen of its ills, a hospital
full of diseases, a prison crowded with malefactors
and debtors, a field of battle strewed with carcases,
a fleet foundering in the ocean, a nation languishing
under tyranny, famine, or pestilence. To turn the gay
side of life to him, and give him a notion of its plea¬
sures, whither should I conduct him ? To a ball, to an
opera, to court ? He might justly think that I was
only showing him a diversity of distress and sorrow/'
 32 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chip, l The Indian schoolmen produce a very similar list1

The «imiur of human ills. The miseries that await th soul
migration from body to body, are threefold in
their nature. Death itself is no release from suffer¬
ing, and the prospect is unending. There are first
the personal afflictions that attach to the body and
the mind, pains of the body arising from disordered
temperament, and pa,ins of the mind proceeding from
lust, anger, avarice, fear, envy, stupefaction, despon¬
dency, and severance from all the soul wotild fain cling
to. The whole head is sick and the whole heart faint.
These are the ills that, in the words of Hume, “ arise
within ourselves, from the distempered condition of the
mind and body.* Next, there is the series of miseries
that spring from the environment, injuries at the hands
of men, and evils from beasts and birds and snakes
and other creeping things, and hurts from plants and
trees and stocks and stones. These, in the list of Hume,
are the “ external insults from animals, from men, from
all the. elements.” Thirdly, there is the train of ills
proceeding from supernatural agency, the terrors of evil
beings and demoniacal possession. These are the
“ imaginary enemies, the demons of man’s fancy, that
haunt him with superstitions terrors.”
To recapitulate: the period in which Indian philo¬
sophy had its rise, is the period in which the original
worship of the forces of nature has given place to the
mechanical repetition of prescriptive usages and sacred
formulas. Side by side with the decay of living faith
in the personified elemental powers there has gone on
a degeneration of the Indo-Arian tribes, partly from
climatic influences, partly from intermixture with
the rude indigenes. This degradation of the national
type marks itself in the worship of the terrific Siva,
1 Hie list is given as in the Sanskrit ddhycUmiha, adliibhau-
SankhyatattvakaranridL The tihiy and adhidaiviJca.
three series of miseries are in
 OF THE UPA NISHADS.
and in the practice of savage qP]f , ,
duction of morbid cere braf conditions•"VtL^ Chap*

of the primitive Aryan rite of!? } reviVal

polyandry and Zsh^ya *
Mahabharata; and finally, and above all in th* ^
.cave belief in the n,is,.,lion ot ^
misery of every form of sentient life. the
 34 THE PHILOSOPHY

CHAPTER II.

THE QUEST OF THE REAL-BRAHMAN AND MAYA,

THE SELF AND THE WORLD-FICTION.

“ A presence that disturbs him with the joy

Of elevated thoughts*; a sense sublime
Of something far more deeply interfused.
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
And the round ocean, and the living air,
And the blue sky, and in the mind of man ;
A motion and a spirit that impels
All thinking things, all objects of all thought,
And rolls through all things.”—Wobdswokth.

“ Nature itself plainly intimates to uh that there is some such abso

lutely perfect Being, incomprehensible to our finite understandings, by
certain passions which it hath implanted in us, that otherwise would
want an object to display themselves upon; namely, those of devout
veneration, adoration, and admiration, together with a kind of ecstasy
and pleasing horror.”—Cudworth.

Chap. IX. Looking behind them and before them, the Indian
Fixity amidst sages, meditating in the solitude of the jungle, find that
the .flux of
tlirng*. the series of lives through which each sentient thing is
passing is flowing forward without a pause, like a river.
Is the river to lose itself at last in the sea ? The sum
of all the several series of lives, and of all the spheres
through which the living soul proceeds, is also in per¬
petual flow. The sum of migrating forms of life, aud of
the spheres through which they migrate, is the ever-
moving world. Everything in it is coming into being
and passing out of being, but never is. The sum of
lives and of the spheres of living things is not real, for
it comes and goes,' rises and passes away, without ceas¬
ing. and that alone is real that neither passes into being
 OF THEVPANISHADS. 35

nor passes out of being, but simply is. To be is to last, chap. ii.
to perdure, What is there.that lasts ? —
Evety one of the countless inodes of life that per- Repo* and
petually replace each other is a new form of misery,
or at . best of fleeting pleasure tainted with pain, andotule'
nothing else is to be looked for in all the varieties of
untried being. ' In every stream of lives there is the
varied .anguish of birth, of care, hunger, weariness,
bereavement, sickness, decay, and death, through em¬
bodiment after embodiment, and through ®eon after
seon. Evil thoughts, evil words, and evil deeds push
the doer downward in the scale of sentiencies, and into
temporary places of torment. Good thoughts, good
■words, and good deeds push the doer upwards into
higher embodiments, and into temporary paradises. It
is the same wearisome journey above and below, miseries
and tainted pleasures that make way for new miseries,
and no end to it all. Good no less than evil activity is
an imperfection, for it only prolongs the stream of lives.
Action is the root of evil. Is there nothing that rests
inert and impassive, untouched with all these miseries
of metempsychosis ?
Again, the scenes through which the sage finds him- unity amidst
self to be migrating are manifold and varied, and present
themselves iu a duality of experience,—the subject on
the one side, the object on the other. The more he
checks the senses and strives to gaze upo'n the inner
light, when he sits rigid and insensate seeking ecstasy,
—the more this plurality tends to fade away, the more
this duality tends to melt into a unity, a one' and only
being. A vhrill of awe runs through the Indian sage as
he finds that this pure and characterless being, this
light within the heart, iu the light of which all things
shine, is the very Self within him, freed from the
flow of experiences for a while by a rigorous effort of
abstraction. A perfect inertion, a perfect abstraction,
have enabled him to reach the last residue of all abstrac-
 36 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. ii. tion, the fontal essence, the inner light, the light beyond
— the darkness of the fleeting forms of conscious life.
These an Times there are, moreover, when he wakes from sleep
lXtaai«pr‘ unbroken with a dream, and is aware that he has slept
32S£!tft at ease, untouched for a space with the miseries of
metempsychosis. Dreamless sleep, like ecstasy itself,
is a transient union with the one and only being that
perdures, and does not pass away as all things .else are
passing, that is inert and untouched with the miseries
of migration, that is beyond the duality of subject and
object, and beyond the plurality of the things of experi¬
ence. Dreamless sleep is, like ecstasy, an unalloyed
beatitude; it is a state in which all differences are
merged, and. for the sleeper the world has melted away.
His very personality has passed back into the imper¬
sonality of the true Self; and if only this state could be
prolonged for ever, it would be a final refuge from the
miseries of life.
Thsysrefound Thus, then, that which only is, while all things else
muXn’rtth come and go, pass, and pass away; that which is un-
uiechjutcter. inched with the hunger, thirst, and pain, and sorrow •
that wait upon all forms of life; that which is one
while all things else are many; that which stands
above and beyond, the duality of all inodes of conscious¬
ness, is the. Self, the one Self within' all sentiencies,
the spiritual principle that permeates and vitalises
all tilings, and gives life and light to all things
living, from a tuft of grass up to the highest deity.
There is one thing that is, and only one—the light
within, the light in which these pleasures and pains,
these fleeting scenes and semblances, come and go, pass
into and pass out of being. This primordial light, this
light of lights, beyond the darkness of the self-feigned
world-fiction, this fontal unity of undifferenced being,
is pure being, pure thought, pure bliss. It is thought in
which fhere is neither thinker nor thing; bliss without
self-gratulation, bliss in which there is nothing that re-
 OF THE U PA NISHADS. 37

joices and nothing rejoiced at; the unspeakable blessed- Chap, il

ness of exemption from vicissitude and misery. “ All
things live upon portions of its joy.” "Who could
bi athe, "who could live, if there were not this bliss
within the ether in the heart ? ” It is not an empty
abstraction; that the Indian mystic in his hour of ecstasy
knows well. It is positive and self-affirming; for, says
Sankaracliarya, the-last residuum of all abstraction is which
not nonentity but entity. It is the object1 of the notion”'r'
notion “ I," and is present to every soul. It is above
and beyond * all modes of conscious thought. “ Words
turn back from it, with the mind, not reaching it.” It
can only be spoken of a3 “ not this, not that,” spoken
of in negatives, and by unsaying what is said. “ It is
thought,” say s the Kena Upanishad, “ by him that thinks
it not; h6 that thinks it knows it not; it is unknown to
them that know it, known to them that' know it not.”
It is at once necessitated to thought and withheld from
positive conception: cognoscendo ignoratur et ignorando
cognoscitur.
Such is the Brahman, the ultimate spiritual reality ashman,«»«
of primitive Indian philosophy, out of which, in its seff™0""1
everlasting union with its counterfeit, Maya, the self-
feigning world-fiction, proceeds the phantasmagory of
metempsychosis. AvidyS, Maya, J>akti, the illusion, the
fiction, the power that resides within the Self as the
future tree resides within the seed,®*—it is out of this,
overspreading the one and only Self, that all things
living, from a tuft of grass to the highest deity, with,
all the spheres through which they migrate, have ema¬
nated to form a world of semblances. They are all
alike figments of this inexplicable world-fiction, the
cosmical illusion.4 Personal souls and their environ¬
ments are fleeting and phantasmagorical, the dreams of

* A hampratyayavithayOi aham- * VaftjcmakSyii^ vain im, 5aa-

padapratyayalaMUdriiui. lax*. ’
“ Sarvabuddhipratyaydtlta. ■ * Viiram&yii, vihajajtani iaktih.
 3* THE PHILOSOPHY.

Chap. it. the spirit of the world;1 and being such, they may be
left behind, if by any means the sage can wake to their
unreality, and find his true being in the original essence,
the one Self, the only light of life. If only he knows
it, he is already this Self, this Brahman, ever pure,
intelligent, and free.2 Pure as untouched by the world-
fiction, passionless, inert; intelligent as self-luminous,
giving light to all the movements of the minds of living
things; free as unembodied, exempt from the miseries
of metempsychosis.
EtTmokp of The original idea of the term Brahman is indicated
Btabman. in its etymology. It is a derivative of the root brih, to
grow, to increase. Thus the scholiast Anandagiri, with
reference to a passage in which Brahman is identified
with one of its manifestations, the breath of life, says
“ Brahman is from brih, to grow, and every one knows
how the body grows by respiration and other functions.”
And in another place, in his gloss on Sankara’s com¬
mentary on the Taittirlyaka Upanishad,. “ The term
Brahman comes from brih, to grow, to expand, and is
expressive of growth and greatness. This Brahman is
Brahman avastness unlimited in space, in time, and in content,
4te> for there is nothing known as a limit to it, and the term
applies to a thing of transcendent greatness/' Perhaps
the earliest sense of the term was the plastic power at
work in the process of things, viewed as an energy of
thought or spirit, a power present everywhere unseen,
that manifests itself most fully in vegetable, animal,
and human life. The cause of all changes in the order
of metempsychosis, it is itself unchangeable. It has
•nothing before it or after it, nothing within it or without
it,* It transcends space and time, and every kind of
object.4 It is the uncaused cause of all, but in its real
nature, and putting the world-fiction and its figments

1 Jagaddt))ian, *.<*, Brahman 3 Tad etad brahmdpurvani ana-

manifesting itself in Lrvara. par am anantwram av&hyam.
* fuddhabuddhat/iuLUit 4 Dekiktilavishay&tivart in.
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 39

out of view, it is, in the phrase of Sankara's commentary chap. ii.

on he Svetaivatara TJpanishad, “ neither cause nor not
cause,rnor both cause and not cause.”
“ It is,” in the words of the Kena TJpanishad, “ other Brahman in-
than the known and above the unknown.” To quote
the scholium of Anandagiri, that which is other than
the knowing subject is either known or unknown, and
thus the text, by denying in regard to Brahman both
the known and the unknown, identifies Brahman with
the Self of the knowing subject.
“ The eye reaches it not, speech reaches it not, thought
reaches it not: we know not, we understand not, how
one should teach it: it is other than the known, above
the unknown. Thus have we heard of the ancients,
who proclaimed it to us.
“ That which is not uttered by the voioe, that by which
the voice is uttered: know thou that that only is the
Self, and not that which men meditate upon as such.
“ That which is not thought by the thought, that by
which the thought is thought: know thou that that
only is the Self, and not that which men meditate upon
as such”
“ Thought,” says Sankara in his exposition of this
text, “is the internal organ, mind, intelligence. Thought
is the inward sense or faculty that co-operates with all
the several organs of sense and motion. Thus the text,
* Desire, volition, doubt, faith/patience and impatience,
and shame, and thought, and fear,—all this is that
inner sense/ The inner sense presents itself only in
th8 form of desire, volition, and the other modifications, Braimuntha
and therefore a man cannot recognise with his inward
sense the intelligential light that gives light to those mental modc-*
modifications. This pure light actuates the inner sense
by irradiation; and as this pure light or Self transcends
all objects of outer and inner sense, the iuward sense
is incompetent to approach itf The inward sense can
only operate when enlightened by the intelligential
 40 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap, il light within, and therefore it is that the expositors of

— Brahman speak of the mind and its modifications as
permeated and objectivised by the Self within/’ In
plain words, when we are told that it is the Self that
thinks the thought, we are to understand, in the lan¬
guage of‘the Indian mystics, that it is the Self that
gives the light to the mental modes in which they
shine—that is, it is the Self that causes the otherwise
unconscious modes to become the conscious modes of
mind. To return to the text of the Kena Upanishad.
“That which one sees not with the eye, that by
which the eyes see: know thou that that only is the
Self, and not that which men meditate upon as such.
"That which one hears hot with the ear, that by which
the ear is heard: know thou that that only is the Self,
and not that which men meditate upon as such.
" That which one breathes not with the breath, that
by which the breath is breathed: know thou that that
only is the Self, and not that which men meditate upon
as such.”
Similarly in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad:—
“ This same imperishable is that which sees unseen,
hears unheard, thinks unthought, and knows unknown.
There is no other than this that sees, no other than
this that hears, no other than this that thinks, no other
than this that knows. Over this imperishable the
expanse is woven woof and warp.1
“ As in dreamless sleep the soul sees, but seesnot this
or that, so the Self in seeing sees not; for there is no
intermission in the sight of the Self that sees; its vision
Beamanfr is one that passes not away; and there is nothin**
am*], and second to that, other than that, apart from that, that it
should see.”
What is meant here is that the thought or intelli¬
gence with which the Self is one, is something beyond
1 The expanue u here a synonym for Maya, the self .feigning world-
the relation of subject and object;1 it^^an^e^ords of Chap, il
Barflatlrtha’s commentary on the Upadelasahasrl, an
eternal objectless cognition.2 The Self is said to be
onmiscient, but the reader must not be misled; this
only means that it is self-luminous, that it gives light
to all things, and to all the modifications of the minds
of sentient beings. Withdraw the light of the Self,
the Indian sages say, and the whole process of things
will lapse into blindness, darkness, nothingness. The
omniscience of the Self is its irradiation of all* things.*
To cite Anandagiri,4 tf It is not literally, but by a figure
that the Self is said to be all-knowing. The cognitions
of the everyday thinker in the sensible world pre¬
suppose faculties and organs; the knowledge that is
the essence of the idea or Self does not presuppose
faculties tend organs, for in that case it could not exist,
as it does exist, in the state of dreamless sleep, in which
the functions of the faculties and organs have ceased/*
It will be well here to point out once for all that we Brahman no*
are to tread warily among these epithets of Brahman, with th©j*r-
If we are to use the language of European philosophy,“chrbtLiu**
we must pronounce the Brahman of the Upanishads to
be unconscious, for consciousness begins where duality
begins. The ideal or spiritual reality of Brahman is
not convertible with conscious spirit. On the contrary,
the spiritual reality that, according to the poets of the
Upanishads, underlies all things, has per se no cogni¬
tion of objects; it transcends the relation of subject
and object; it lies beyond duality. It is, true that these
poets speak of it as existence, intelligence, beatitude.
But we must be cautious. Brahman is not intelligence
in our sense of the word. The intelligence, the thought,
that is the Self and which the Self is, is described as
eternal knowledge, without objects, the imparting of
light to the cognitions of migrating sentiencies. This
1 JiidtrijiUyabhd vdtirUda. 1 Sarv&va bhdaakatva.
9 JVityarji nirviehayaiji jndnam, 4 Sarmjnam, bnUunopacharyaSe.
 42 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. IL thought is characterless and eternal; their cognitions are

charactered, and come and go. Brahman is beatitude.
But we must again be cautious. Brahman is not beati¬
tude in the ordinary sense of the word. It is a bKas
beyond the distinction of subject and object, a bliss the
poets of the Upanishads liken to dreamless sleep. Brah¬
man per se is neither God nor conscious God; and on
this it is necessary to insist, to exclude the baseless ana¬
logies to Christian theology that have sometimes been
imagined by writers, Indian and European. Be it then
repeated that the Indian philosophers everywhere affirm
that Brahman is knowledge, not that Brahman has
knowledge; that this knowledge is without an object
known, and that omniscience is predicable of Brahman,
only by a metaphor. If we were to misinterpret such
knowledge by the word “consciousness,” we should
still have to say that Brahma is consciousness, not that
Brahman has consciousness or is a conscious spirit.
To return to the text of the Byihadaranyaka.
Brahmtm the “ As in dreamless sleep the soul hears, but hears not
pure light of
elwracterless this or that, so the Self in hearing hears not; for there
knowledge.
is no intermission in the hearing of the Self that hears;
its audition is one that passes not away; and there is
nothing second to that, other than that, apart from that,
that it should hear.
“As in dreamless sleep the'soul thinks, but thinks
not this or that, so in thinking the Self thinks not; for
there is no intermission in the thought of the Self that
thinks; its thought is one that passes not away; and
there is nothing second to that, other than that, apart
from that, that it should think.'
“ As in dreamless sleep the soul knows, but knows
not this or that, so in knowing the Self knows not; for
there is no intermission in the knowledge of the',Self
that knows, for its knowledge is one that passes not
away; and there is nothing second to that, other than
that, apart from that, that it should know.”
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 43

■When overspread with the self-feigning world-fiction, chap, it

the Self is that out of which all things and all forms
of life ^proceed. It is, in the words of the Mundlaka
Cpanishad, that on knowing which all things are
known; in the words of the Chhandogya, that by in¬
struction in which the unthought becomes thought,
.^nd the unknown known. As the Indian scholiasts
say: If we know Brahman we know all things: if we
know what clay is, we know what all the variety of
pots and pans art, that the potter fashions out of clay;
if we know what gold is, we know what all the varieties
of earrings, bracelets, and other trinkets are, that the
goldsmith fashions out of gold. Thus, to quote the
Chhandogya Upanishad:—
- ,
" Svetaketu was the grandson of Aruna. His father Brahman that
° * which being
Arum sai'u to him: Svetaketu. thou must enter on tliy known, »u
sacred studentship. Hone of our family, my dear son, known,-the
is unstudied, a Brahman only in lineage. Svetaketu
therefore at the age of twelve repaired to a spiritual
preceptor, and at the age of four-and-twenty came home*
after going through all the Vedas, conceited, pedantic,
and opinionated. His father said to him: Svetaketu,
tell me, my son, since thou art so conceited, pedantic,
and opinionated, hast thou asked for that instruction
by which the unheard becomes heard, the unthought
thought, the unknown known ?
“ Holy sir, how is that instruction given ?
“ His father said: My son, as everything made of
clay is known by a single lump of clay, being nothing
more than a modification of speech, a change, a name,
while the clay is the only truth:
" As everything made of .gold is known by a single
lump of gold,* being nothing more than a modification
of speech, a change, a name, *while the gold is the only
truth:
u As everything made of steel is known by a single
pair of nail-scissors, being nothing more than a modi
 44 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap, il fication of speech, a change, a name, while the steel is

the only truth:
“ Such, my son, is that instruction.”
Brahman is, as has been already seen, said to be
“ existent, thought, bliss.” In the Taittirtya Upanishad
the Self is said to be “ truth, knowledge, infinity.”
&ankaracharya’s remarks on this passage of the Taii-
tirlya will serve also to illustrate the foregoing^ extract
from the Chhandogya. " Self,” he says, “ is truth; Self
is knowledge; Self is infinity, A thing is true if it ik
neither more nor less than it is taken to be. It is false
if it is more or less than that. Hence every form of
derived or emanatory existence is fictitious, nothing
more than a modification of speech, a change, a mwie,
and the clay is the only truth. That which is being
found to be the only truth, the words ‘ the Self is. truth’
negative all modification of the Self. It follows that ■
Brahman is the cause or fontal essence. It operates as
such, because it is the reality. Lest it should be sup¬
posed that Brahman being that of which all things ate
made, it must be unspiritual, like the potter’s clay, the
text proceeds to say that the Self is knowledge. The
term knowledge is abstract, standing as an epithet of
Brahman together with truth and infinity. If know¬
ledge meant here a snbject knowing, the epithet would
be incompatible with the other two. If Brahman were
a knowing subject, it would be modified in its cogni¬
tions, and how then could it be the truth ? A thing is
infinite when it cannot be limited at any point. If the
Self were a knowing subject, it would be limited by the
cognita and the cognitions. Another text says: That is
the infinite in which nothing else is known, and that is
the finite in which one knows something else. As pre¬
dicated of the Self along with truth and infinity, know¬
ledge is thus an abstract term.. The words ‘Self is
knowledge’ are intended at once to deny agency and
actum, and . to deny that the Self or Brahman is. an
 OF THE VPANISHADS. 45

unspiritual thing such as the potter’s clay in the fam'i- chap, il

liar example. The same words ‘Seif is knowledge’
might be imagined to imply the finitude of Self, foras¬
much as all the cognitions of everyday life are limited
or finite. The epithet ‘infinite’ is added to exclude
this idea of finitude. The term infiuite is negative,
refusing the presence of limits; the epithets truth and
knowledge are positive, giving a sense of their own.
The knowledge of Brahman is nothing else than the
essence the Self itself, like the light of the sun, or
the heat of fire. It is the eternal essence of the Self,
and does not depend on conditions foreign to itself, a3
our experiences do.”
■ These remarks must suffice for the present in regard Brahmin a*
to Brahman. The several elements of the cosmical n»at7. ;n»
conception of the poets of the Upanishads are so closely
interfused, that it is not possible with any ingenuity tbeww-id- '•
altogether to separate them for convenience of exposi¬
tion. So far as may be, however, these elements must
be exhibited in successive order, proceeding from Brah¬
man to Maya; from Maya to the union, from before all
time, between Brahman and Maya; from this union to
the resultant procession of migrating souls and of the
sphere4 of their migration, and the hierarchic emanations
livaret Hiranyagarbha, and Yiraj, severally representing
the sums of living things in the three several states of
dreamless -sleep, of dreaming sleep, and of waking con*,
sciousness; and finally reverting to the “ fourth ” so
called in contradistinction to the three states or modes
of life, that is, to the original unity of characterless
being or Brahman, Brahman per u is the principle
of reality, the one and only being; Self alone is, and all
else only seems to be. This principle of reality, how¬
ever, has been from everlasting associated with an
inexplicable principle of unreality; and it is from the
fictitious union of these principles, the one real, the
other only a self-feigned fiction, that the spheres and
 46 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. IX. the migrating forms of life, the external and internal
•world, proceed.
the illu - Maya may he .regarded both in parts and in the
sinn in every
individual whole. Viewed in parts, it is the particular illusion
soul.
that veih from each form of life its own true nature
as the one and only Self. Under its influence every
kind of sentient being is said to identify itself, not with
the Self that is one and the same in all, but w ith its
counterfeit presentment,1 the invisible body that accom¬
panies it through its migrations, and the visible bodies
that it animates successively. Thus every living thing
is a fictitiously detached portion, an illusive emanation
of Brahman. Maya overspreads Brahman as a cloud
overspreads the sun, veiling from it its proper nature,
and projecting the world of semblances, the phantas-
magory of metempsychosis. For every form of life,
from the lowest to the highest, from a mere tuft of
grass up to the highest deity, its own proper nature is
veiled, and a bodily counterfeit presented in lieu of it,
-by the primeval illusion or self-feigning fiction, Avidya
or Maya. Hence all individual existences, and the
long miseries of metempsychosis, in the procession of
the aeons without beginning and without end; for the
world is-from everlasting, and every genesis of things
is only a palingenesis. The procession of the aeons is
often likened to a succession of dreams. The world is
ofteh said to be the mind-projected figment of migrating
souls.® It is, says Sankaiaeharya, only an emanation
of tba internal sense of sentient beings, and this is
proved by the. fact that the world is resolved back into
their inner sense in their intervals of dreamless sleep.®
As emanating from such illusion, the world of me-
1 Technically styled its upadJii. aram eva jagat, manasy eva sueh-
The totality of Mays is the upadhi upte <pralaya(larianat. Elsewhere
of Isvara. Portions of Mays are the phrase fiiaviovijhrinibhitam.
the several up&dhis of the jlvas or a PrapancJiasya may ay a vid-
migrating souls.
yamtinatvam, na tu vastuivam.
* Sarram ftv OMiahhareataviJr.
 OF THE UPANISHADS, 47

tenipsychosis has an existence, but this existence is chap. ii.

unreal
Maya, viewed as a whole, is the cosmical illusion, the Maya the niu-
self-feigning world-fiction, .that is without beginning.1 un¬

it is said to be “ neither entity nor nonentity, nor both

in one, inexplicable by entity and by nonentity, fieti- ^TaT^th0’
tious, and without beginning.” It is not a rnereBxaliman*
nothing, but a nescio quid. It is an illusion projected
by illusion, an unreal unreality, the three primitive
elements of pleasure, pain, and indolence2 in co¬
equality, overspreading the one and only Self from
everlasting. It is the sum of the illusions of all indi¬
vidual souls, as a forest is an aggregate of trees. It is
the power, cognitive and active, of Evara, the artifex
opifexque mundi dew, the Archimagus, or Demiurgus,
who is th first emanation of Brahman. It is his power
of illusory creation, the power out of which proceed all
migrating .souls and all that they experience in their
migrations. Brahman, or Self per se, is changeless,
but in.union with Maya becomes8 fictitiously the basis
of this baseless world, and underlies the world-fiction
out of which the ever-changing figment-worlds proceed
in aeon after aeon. From the reflection upon Maya,
the world-fiction, of Brahman, the one and only Self,
proceeds the first and highest of all emanations, l£vara,
the cosmic soul, the Demiurgus. Maya4 thus pre¬
exists with Brahman, but Brahman is not thereby any
the less the one and only being, in like manner as the
possibility of the future tree pre-exists in the seed of
the tree, without the seed becoming any the less a one
and only seed. Maya is the indifferent aggregate of all
the possibilities of emanatory or derived existences,
pre-existing together with Brahman, as the possibility

1 Vibamdy&t anadimdya. * Vivartyopaddna.

* THgunMmikd m&yd, gunatra- 4 BhavimiavrikshUaktimad vU
ytus&myam mdyaiattvam^ sukha- jam svasaktya na tadvitiyam IcaU
duAkhamohatmakdieshaprapancha- Jnjate, tadvad brahmdpi na m&yd-
rupd m&yd. Mtya mdritvjam.
 THE PHILOSOPHY

Ciuy. ii. of the tree pre-exists in the seed. Maya is the autfl-
lary Associate of the Archimagus. Maya, though un¬
conscious, is said to energise in the evolution of the
world through its proximity to the inert and impass’ve
Brahman, as the unconscious iron is set in motion
through its proximity to the loadstone. Maya is that
out of which, literally speaking, the world proceeds; it
is said, by a figure of speech, to emanate from Brahman.
MayS is the literal. Brahman the figurative up&dana, or
' principle out of which all things emanate.
It is Maya1 that presents the multifold of experience.
The world, with its apparent duality of subject and
object, of external and internal orders, is the figment
of this fiction, the imagination of illusion. All that
presents itself to the migrating soul in its series ot
embodiments, lies unrealiy above the real like the
redness or blackness of the sky, which is seen there
though the sky itself is never red or black, like the
waters of a mirage, like the visions of the dreaming
phantasy, like the airy fabric of a daydream, like the
bubbles on the surface of a stream, like the silver seen
on the shell of a pearl-oyster, like the snake that the
belated wayfarer sees in a piece of rope, like the gloom
that encircles the owl amidst the noonday glare. All
the stir of daily life, all the feverish pleasures and
pains of life after life, are the phantasmagory of a
wakiftg dream. For the soul that wakes to its own
natme these things cease to be, and, what is more,
have never so mnch as been.
Brahman and Maya have co-existed from everlasting,
and their association and union is eternal. Apart from
AvidyS or Maya, Brahman is purely characterless and
indeterminate,* and is not to be regarded as the prin¬
ciple from which things emanate, and again, js not to
be regarded as not that principle;, nor is it to be
affirmed to be both that principle and not that prin-
'ridya,
* SaakaiSchii?* on Sv«ta4vatar& TTpanishad r, 3.
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 49
cip*e at once, nop is it to be denied to be both. Self Char a.
ptr sj is neither prindpium nor principiata. When
the wofld is said to emanate from Brahman, we are
a ays fo understand that it proceeds, not from Brah¬
man per se, bnt from Brahman reflected upon Maya,1 or
fictitiously limited by the limitations of the world-
fiction. Maya, in its totality, is the limitative coun¬
terfeit- of Brahman* or the power of llvara, the Brabmwncti
Mayavin, or Archimagus, or JDemiurgus. The limita- wSiS11*
tions of the illimitable Brahman are derived from this pHumI^
limitative counterf —its limitations through which ^%f8P>u"
it manifests itself aos god, and man, and animal, and
plant, and so forth. It is through this union from
before all time with this inexplicable illusion, that
the one and only Self presents itself in the endless
plurality and diversity of transient deities, of migrating
spirits, anc( of the worlds through which they migrate.
It is through this union that the one and only Self is
present in every creature, as one and the same ether
is present in many water-jars, as one and the same sun
is mirrored on countless sheets of water. It is through
this union that the one and only Self permeates and
animates the world. In the words of Sankara:* “ The
image of the sun upon a piece of water expands with
the expansion, and contracts with the contraction, of
the ripples on the surface i moves with the motion, and
is severed by the breaking, of- the ripples. .The reflec¬
tion of the sun thus follows the various conditions of
the surface, but not so the real sun in the heavens.
It is in a similar manner that the real Self is reflected
upon it* Counterfeits, the bodies of sentient creatures,
and, thus fictitiously limited, shares their growth and
diminution, and other sensible modes of being. Apart
1 Tad eva chaiUwyam m&vd- and sometimes to limit Brahman
praHvimbitarilpena ktitraqa™ fictitiously. * UpddkL
v/cUu Anandagiri on the Mui)- 54 In the introduction to his
daka ITpanisbacL M&yfl is some- Commentary on the Svetfflvatara
times said to reflect Brahman, Upanishad
T)
 So THE PHILOSOPHY

ckii. n. from its various counterfeits, the Self is changeless,and

' unvaried.” The one And only Self is present in the-heart
of every living thing, as one and the same face may be
reflected upon a succession of mirrors.1 Such are th e
among the many images employed by the ancient
Indian philosophers, to illustrate the presence of one
spiritual essence in all the innumerable forms of living
things. Others ■will be met with in the sequel With
almost the same imagery Plotinus speaks of the one life
in all things living like the one light shining in many
houses, as if itself many, and yet one and undivided; the
one life shining into and vitalising all bodies, project¬
ing pictures of itself, like one face seen upon a multi¬
tude of mirrors. Elsewhere he says that we are one in
God, and again other than God, as the solar rays are one
with the sun and other than the sun. And with a like
simile Fichte: “ In all -the forms that surround me I
behold the reflection of my own being, broken up into
countless diversified shapes, as the morning sun, broken
in a thousand dewdrops, sparkles towards itself.”
Thebienrohy Maya, then, has fictitiously associated itself to Brah-
wit of Brah-1* man from everlasting. In the series of seons, without
nays. beginning and without end, the forms of life have at
the beginning of each aeon emanated in the following
hierarchic succession.
FiTSfc aPP®ar3 I^ara, the Mayin or Mayavin, the
^i°I?e?t3’0ltte '&rch-ilhisionist,* the world-projecting deity, himself a
•mheWioiafigment of the cosmic fiction, himself an unreality;
an unreality for the philosopher intent on the one and
only truth, relatively a reality for the multitude, to
whom the world exists with all its.possibilities of pain.
The totality of illusion is the body or counterfeit pre¬
sentment of the Archimagus, out of which all things
emanate.2 Illusion, the world-fiction, may be viewed

ijody, the body out of which things

 OF THE UPANISHADS. 51

in its several parts in the minds of the migrating chap. II.

sentiec cies, or in its totality as the sum of pleasures,
pains, and indolences. The Demiurgus, then, is the
Seif with the totality of illusion as its counterfeit
presentment; the Self proceeding into fictitious mani¬
festation, as the worlds and the migrating sentiencies
that pass through them. The illusion of each of these
sentiencies veils from it its true nature as the one and
only Self; the illusion of all sentiencies taken together
veils from them all their true nature as the one and
only Self. The Demiurgus is identified with the sum of
sentiencies in the state of dreamless sleep. His body,
the principle of emanations, as the sum of the bodies
of living things in the state of dreamless sleep, is the
beatific vesture.1 The Demiurgus is one, the sentien¬
cies are nrttny, as a forest is one and as the trees in it
are many; as a piece of water is one and as the drops
of water in it are many; and the one Demiurgus and
the many dreamless, sleeping sentiencies are one and
the same being, viewed now as whole, and now as
parts. The same Brahman, the one and only Self, is
present wholly in the Demiurgus, and present wholly
in each dreamless, sleeping sentiency, as the same ether,
one and undivided, is present to the whole forest and
present to each and every tree; or as the same sky, one
and undivided, is reflected upon the whole watery sur¬
face and on each portion of that surface.
The Archimagus is said to be omniscient, as being
the witness of all lifeless and all living forms of exist- gwerofrecom-
. pence, tpw in-
ence. As ruling all migrating souls, and as giving tO temal ruler,
each its dole of pleasures and pains in conformity with
the retributive fatality inherent in the process of things,
he is ISvara, the lord. As setting all souls in. motion,
and thus acting through them, he is the actuator. As
dwelling in the heart of each and every living soul, and
1 ft ^Tapper lists of the undifferenced bcati-
of the migrating -soul, that con- tude of dreamless deep.
 52 THE PHILOSOPHY

Out*, it fashioning its every mental'mode, he is the internal

ruler.
“ The lord of all, himself through all diffused.
Sustains and is the life of all that live,”

In this last character the Demiurgus, the highest

emanation of Brahman, is described in the Brihadar-
anyaka TXpanishad:—
“That which dwells in earth, .inside the earth, and
the earth knows hot, whose body the earth is, which
actuates the earth from within,—that is thy Self, the
internal ruler, immortaL
“ That which dwells in water, inside the wucer, and
the water know? not, whose body the water is; which
actuates the water from within,—that is thy Self, the
internal ruler; immortal.
“ That which dwells in fire, inside the fire, .end the fire
knows not, whose body the fire is, which actuates the fire
from within,—that is thy Self, the internal ruler,immortal.
“That which dwells in air, inside the air, and the
air knows not, whose body the air is, which actuates
the air from within,—that is thy Self, the internal
ruler, immortal. .
“ That which dwells in wind, inside the wind, and
the wind knows not, whose body the wind is, which
actuates the wind from within.—^that is thy Self, the
internal ruler immortaL
“ That which dwells in the sky, inside the sky, and
the sky knows mot,-whose body the sky is, which
actuates the sky from within,-^-that is thy Self, the
internal ruler, immortaL
“That which dwells in the Sun, inside the sun, and
the sun knows not, whose body the. ssm is, which
actuates, the sun from within,—that is thy Self, the
internal ruler, immortaL
“That which dwells in moon and stars, inside the
moon and stars, and the moon and stars know not,
whose body the moon and stars ate which actuates the
 OF THE VPANISHADS. S3
taoon and stars from within,—that is thy Self, the Chap. IL
■ internal ruler, immortal. —1
“ That which dwells in all living things, inside the
living things, and all living things know not, whose
body all living things are, which .actuates all living
things from within,—that is thy Self, the internal
taler, immortal.
“ That which dwells within mind, inside the mind,
and the mind knows not, whose body the mind is*
which actuates the mind from within,'—that is thy
Self, the internal ruler, immortal,
^ That which sees unseen, hears unheard, thinks un¬
thought upon, knows unknown; that other than which
there is none that sees, none that hears, none that
thinks, none that knows,—that is thy Self, the internal
ruler, immortal.”
It must be observed that this conception of the tflrayou
Demiurgus or world-projecting deity is not theistic. ”*♦*■”*•
He is nothing else than the totality of souls in dream¬
less sleep, present in the heart of every living thing;.
himself only the first figment of the world-fiction, k'wr* o»
resolved into the characterless unity of Brahman atotthewnu.
** fiction*
the clctee of each age, of the world, and issuing out of
that unity at each palingenesia in the eternal proces¬
sion of the aeons. He is eternal, but every migrating
soul is co-eternal with him, a co-eternal and only
equally fictitious emanation of the one and only Selfi
He can hardly be conceived, to have any separate per¬
sonality, apart from the souls he permeates and vivifies;
and his state is not one of consciousness, but that of
the pure bliss of dreamless sleep. One with the sum
of living beings in that state, he is yet said to allot to
each of them their portion of weal and woe, but only
in accordance with their merits in prior forms of em¬
bodied existence. Itfvara is feared by the many, as the
deity that retracts them into nis own essence, at the
close of each'seen, and that caste the evil-doer into
 54 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chat. It places of torment; but the perfect sage- learns that

Isvara is unreal, and passes beyond all fear of ninn
Isvara is no less unreal than the migrating soul; he is
the first figment of the cosmical illusion; and both’
Isvara and the soul are only so far existent as they are
fictitious manifestations of the one and only Self,
Hirany»gw- The next emanation in the order of descent is
Hiranyagarbha, Prana, Sutratman, the Goldeif Germ,
•eanendw. ^ £reath of Life. the Thread-spiiit. This divine
emanation is the totality of migrating souls in the state
of dreaming sleep, the sum of the dreaming conscious-r
ness of the world. His body is the sum of the invisible
bodies, the tenuous inwlucra? clothed in which the
soul passes from body to body in the long process of me¬
tempsychosis. These invisible bodies are made up of
three vestures one upon the other, the cognicional, the
sensorial, and the aerial garments of the soul. Within
these, as its first and innermost garment,' the soul, as
one with the Archimagus, is clad with the beatific
vesture already spoken of; and outermost of all it has,
as we shall presently see, its fifth and last garment, the
nutnmentitious vesture, the visible and tangible body
of the world of sense, which is born and dies and passes
back into the elements, the muddy vesture of decay.
Three, then, of these five wrappers clothe2 Hiranya-
garblia. He is called the Thread-spirit, as stringing
together all dreaming souls clothed in the invisible
bodies that accompany them in their migrations, as
pearls are strung upon a thread to form a necklace. He
is the sum of souls that illusively identify themselves
with their tenuous involucra. It is thus that a place is
provided in the cosmical conception of the poets of the
Upanishads for the Hiranyagarbha of the ancient Risliis,
« t&ixhmasartra* vij Manama yakogJui^ the manouwyfy
_JP *6 wrapper* of the mi- kotha, the prdnamayakosha (these
grafaog soul are g^led wiccessivdy three a?e the ; and the
m Saaaqrm the antuidamayakoaka annamayakoaJta (this is the slka*
(this is the Itara$aforira) • the lahrira).
 OF THE UPA NISHADS. 55

the Golden Germ that arose in the beginning, the lord Chap. h.
of things that are, the establisher of the earth and sky,
the giver of life and breath.
The third and lowest of the progressive emanations vwj, th»
is Viraj, VaiSvanara, Prajapati, or Purusha. His
is the whole mundane egg, the outer shell of the visible cI“'
world, or the sum of the visible and perishing bodies .of
migrating souls. He is identified with the totality of
waking consciousness, with the sum of souls in the
waking state, and the sum of their gross, visible, and
tangible environments. In this divine emanation a
place is provided by the poets of the Upanishads for
the Purusha of the ancient Eishis, the divine being out
of whom, offered up as a sacrificial victim by the gods, the
Sadhyas, and the Eishis, the visible and tangible world
proceeded. He is the sum of souls that illusively
identify themselves with their outer bodies, and thus
suffer hunger, thirst, and faintness, and all the other
miseries of metempsychosis.
The nature of spiritual' entity unmanifest and mani¬
fest, in its fourfold grades, is set forth in the following
lines taken from Sankaracharya’s exposition of the
Aitareya Upanishad:—
. “ First, there is the one' and only Self, apart from all
duality, in which have ceased to appear the various
counterfeit presentments or fictitious bodies and en¬
vironments of the world of semblances; passionless,
pure, inert, peaceful, to be known by the negation of
every epithet, not to’be reached by any word or
thought.
“ Secondly,, this same Self emanates in the form of
the omniscient Demiurgus, whose counterfeit present¬
ment or fictitious body is cognition in its utmost purity.;
who sets in motion the general undifferenced germ of
the worlds, the cosmical illusion; and is styled the
internal ruler, as actuating all things horn within.
“Thirdly, this same Self emanates in the form -ef
 j6 THE PHILOSOPHY

CsjUP* n
Hiranyagarbha, or the spirit that illusively identifies
itself with the mental movements that are the gfena of
the passing spheres.
“Fourthly, this same Self emanates in the form of
spirit in- its earliest embodiment within the outer shell
of things, as VirSj or PrajapatL 4
“And finally, the same Self comes to be designated
nnder the names of Agni and the other god£, in its
counterfeit presentments in the form of visible fire and
so forth. It is thus that Brahman assumes this and
that name and form, by taking, to itself a variety of
fictitious bodily presentments, from a tuft of grass up
to Brahma, .the highest' of the deities.”
Anandagiri, in his gloss bn this passage of Sankara*
charya,adds that the Self fictitiously manifests itself in
human and other sentiencies, as well as in the gods, and
is thus, illusively, the sum of life.
Brahman per se, apart from fictitious manifestation,
is the hfirgunam Brahma of Indian philosophy; that is
to say, the Self free from the primoTdia, Self apart from
pleasures, pains, and indolences, the three factors of the
world-fiction, the three strands of the rope that ties the
soul to the miseries of metempsychosis.
Brahman in its hierarchic emanations as ISvara,
Hiranyagarbha, and Viraj, is the Sagunam Brahma nr
Sabalam Brahma of Indian philosophy; that is to say,
the Self as fictitiously implicated in the pleasures, pains,
and indolences that make up the world-fiction, and are
experienced by migrating souls.
«x things To six things there has been no beginning: souls
|hnln^ have been passing from body to body, through aeon
after aeon, from eternity; the Demiurgus has co-existed
with and in them from eternity; there has been a dis¬
tinction between the souls and the Demiurgus from
eternity; the pure intelligence, the undifferenced Self,
has existed from eternity; the distinction between the
Demiurgus and that Self is from eternity; Maya, the self-
 of m miSm a
feigning Torld-Mon,has feigned Mi from everlasting, Cui.IL
and die muon d Mlja vitb Brethman is itself etocqid. “
The migrating souls ire Dotting else than the one and
only Self fictitiously limiting itself to various individual
minds, these individual minds heibg various emanations
of the cosmical illusion. Self is true; the ever-moving
world jb false; and the migrating souls that seem to he,
and do,'and suffer, are nothing else than that one and
only Self, clothed in die five successive vestures or
Mn, the beatific, the cognitions], the sensorial, the
vesture of the vital son, and the nutrimentitious ves¬
ture or visible body in the world of sense. To him
that sees the truth, all these bodies and their environ¬
ments vrill disappear, merging themselves into that
fontal essence; and the Self trill alone remain, a fulness
of unbroken and unmingled tdisa
 THE PHILOSOPHY

CHAPTEB III.

THE RELEASE FROM METEMPSYCHOSIS

“ To them I may have owed another gift

Of aspect more sublime; that blessed mood
In which the burthen of the mysteiy.
In which the heavy and the weary weight'
Of all this unintelligible world
Is lightened j that serene and blessed mood
In which the affections gently lead us on
Until the breath of this corporeal frame,
And even the motion of our human blood
Almost suspended, we are laid asleep
In body, and become a living soul:—
While with an eye made quiet by the power
Of harmony and the deep power of joy,
We see into the life of things.”—Wordswobth*

“ Moriturus Plotinus ad Kustochium dixit, se in eo esse ut quod in

se haberet divinum xpbt tOtt# torrl tfcTov adducent.”—Vaurigius.

Oflip. iil The gum of being, as pictured by the poets of the

R*MM«tto Upanishads, may be retraced,in the regressive order,
tsstt. from the outermost to the innermost vesture of the
soul, from the outermost to the innermost body, and
beyond to the spiritual reality that alone abides for
ever. The lowest grade of life is that of the Aral in
this visible and tangible world, passing from body to
body, through sphere after sphere of being, through
aeon after seen. The migrating soul is the one and only
Self fictitiously limiting itself to this or that individual
mind j and each individual mind is nothing more
one of tie innumerable emanations of the cosmical
illusion. To this migration there has been no begin-
 OF THB UPANISHADS. 59

•limg, and it is Hard to find the end. At every stage. Chap, iil
above and below, it is. the same wearisome journey,
miseries and tainted pleasures that give place to fresh
miseries, to new care, hunger, thirst; bereavement, sick-
1 tiess, and decay. It would be intolerable to think that
this never-ceasing iteration of pains is real, for then it
could not be made to disappearbut to a true insight
it is not^real.; it is but a fiction, for it comes and goes,
passes into being and passes out of being; and that
alone is real that neither comes nor goes, neither passes
into being nor passes out of being, but simply is. To
be is to last,—to perdure; but what is there that lasts ?
There is, they say, but one thing that lasts: the light
within, the light in which these pains and tainted plea¬
sures, these shifting scenes and semblances, come and
go, pass into, and pass out of being. This primordial
light beyond the darkness of the world-fiction, this
fontal unity of characterless, being, beyond the duality
of subject and object, beyond the plurality of the phan¬
tasmagoric spheres- of metempsychosis, is pure being*
pure thought, pure bliss. This alone it is that permeates
and vitalises all things, giving Ught and life to all that
live. It is through its connection from before all ages
with AvidyS, Maya, the self-feigning world-fiction, that
this light, this Self, passes into the semblances of dual¬
ity and plurality, and in the shape of innumerable
living beings passes through successive spheres of trans-
migratory experience, as through dream after dream.
To wake from his dreams, to extricate himself from
metempsychosis, the sage must penetrate through the
unreal into the real, must refund his personality into
the impersonality of the one and only Self. The way Purificatory
to this is a process of purificatory virtues, that may be nwdrton,
the work of many successive lives; a renouncement of ab»tMu&un.
family, home, and worldly ties; the laying aside of the rSmiSa?™*
five successive vestures of the soul by the repression
of every feeling, every desire, and every thought; the
practice of apathy, vacuity, and ecstasy. A rigorous
 50 THE PHILOSOPHY

cup.ni. process of abstraction melts away tke. nutrinientitioa*

— vesture of the soul into the vesture, of tlie vr ?i < aiia*
rihia iirto the sensorial vesture, this into the cognitiortal
vesture; this into the beatific vesture of the so in
union with the Demiurgus. And after this, it is only a
yet more perfect inertion and yet further abstraction
tw can enable him. to reach the last residue of^all
abstraction, the light, within the heart, -the •spiritual
unity of undifferenced being. After he has stripped off
the successive vestures of his soul, and has reached this
Iflgfc, this highest mode of being, the intuition of the
Self, nothing remains hut that this intuition, itself, as
itself a mental modification, pass away, vanishing into
the pure light of characterless being; tha+ this light,
this undifferenced unity, may alone remain, the. isolated,
only reality. The sage to whose inner faculties this
vision is present lives on in the body, till the expiry of
the merits that have procured his present embodiment
At last his body falls away, and his soul re-enters the
one and'only Self, returning to its proper state of pert
feet-indetermination, to abide in itself as characterless
being, pure intelligence, undifferenced beatitude.
“The one teihaina, the many change and pass;
fieayen’g light for ever, shines, earth's shadows fly;
lifej likes dome-ef many-coloured glass,
Stains the white radiance of eternity.”

n»udr>- On the liberation of the sage, , to use the language

sas*-*1 of the Viveka6hudamaui, all things visible melt away
into the original Self, as the darkness faints and melts
aw&y before the rising sun.. Its fictitiously limiting
mind with all its modes has been dissolved, and the
soul is the Self again; the jar is broken, and the ether
that was in it is one with the one and undivided ether,
from which ihe jar once seemed to sever it. Tbe sage
has seen the Self, and passed into oneness with It, lost
likea water-drop in water. His implication in metemp-
sychosis, .and his extrication from it, have been hut
 OP THE VPAtUSHADS. 61

figments of the cosmic fictionunreal as the snake that cam. tn

appe r and vanishes in place of the piece of tope, to
the eyes of the belated traveller. He has had life after
life com time without beginning, bat these were but a
series of dreams. At last he is awake, and his dream-
lives are nullities. In pure verity it is only the Sell
that ever is or has been. The world ha3 neither come
into being nor passed oat of being. There has been
no fatal migration of the soul, no worshipper seeking
recompense or mental purity, no sage yearning, after
liberation, and no soulhas been liberated. These things
were phantasmagoric figments, a play of semblances, a
darkness, an absence of light. Now the light is veiled
no more, and remains a.pure undifferenced light, and'
is in truth the only thing that ever has been, and
everi&
This is the end of the knowledge of the divine Self,
.the consummation of theosophy.
Thus liberated from metempsychosis, but still living nowgtt®
in the body, the sage is untouched by merit and de-
merit, unsoiled by sinfnl works, uninjured by what be
has done and by what he has left undone, unimplicated
in his actions good ot eriL Good works, no less than
evil works, and equally the Demiurgus that recom¬
penses them, belong to the unreal, to the fictitious, plu¬
rality of the world of semblances. As -Sankaracliarya
says, in his introduction to the &vet£UvataraUpanishad,
**Gh6sis once arisen needs nothing farther for the reali¬
sation of its result; it requires avbsidia only that it may
ariseand Anandagiri says, “ The perfect sage, so long
as he lives, may do good and evil as. he chooses, and
incur no stain; such is the efficacy of a knowledge of
the Self.”
How the individual soul is ho recognise and recover
its unity with the universal soul, and thus with the one
and only Self, is taught in the following verses of die
GhhSndogya Upanishad, known as the Sanddyavidyfi,
or doctrine of the sage fsandilya. These verses are of
 63 THE PHILOSOPHY

Cfl4f.ui. very frequent citation in the works of the VedSniSb.

schoolmen:—
2fi'aadSru “ All this world is the Self. It arises out of, returns
d°g»ppmi- into, breathes in, the Self. Let the wise man be stal*.
wtSTtooM?* and meditate upon the Self.
mis «nd Mid « jhe goul is made of thought and as its thought has
been in this life, such shall its nature be when it depute
oat of this life. The wise man, therefore, must think
thus:
“ The- universal soul1 is operative in the inward
sense, embodied in the vital air;* it is the pure light,
the unfailing will, the ethereal essence, out of which
all creations, all desires, all sweet sounds, and all sweet
tastes proceed. It pervades all things, silent and un¬
perturbed.
“This universal soul is my soul within the heart,
smaller than a grain of rice, a barleycorn, a mustard-
seed, a grain of millet, or the kernel of a grain of millet
This is my soul within the heart greater than the earth,
the air, the sky, greater than these worlds,
“Out of this universal soul all creations, all desires,
«11 sweet sounds, and all sweet tastes proceed. It per¬
meates all things, speechless, passionless. This is my
soul within the heart This is Brahman. As soon as I
depart out of this life I shall win re-union with the Self.
“ He that has this faith has no more doubt. These
are the words of flaodiLya.”
'When Brahman is viewed as in union with Maya,
Brahman becomes Iivara, the cosmic sjoul, the world-
evolving deity; and Maya is. the cosmic body, the body
of the Demiuigus livara. - Sapdilya teaches that the
soul realises and recovers Its- unity with the cosmic
soul, and with the characterless Self beyond and above
the cosmic-soul, by meditative ecstasy.
1 The universal ion! ii Uvara, * Migrating along with ■ the
the Self in^ manifestation m the invisible body or tenuous imaoZu-
crestiye spirit and soul of the crum through a., succession of
irodd, the viivalxtrtri and jaga- visible bodies. •
 OF THE VPANISHADS, f>3

ononciation, ecstasy, and the liberation of the soul ciur. in.

drf spoken of as follows in the Brihadarapyaka Upani-
sfc*** •—
Invisible is the path, outspread, primeval, that I Bamudatia
Ihme reached, tnat Z have discovered; .the sages, they
boat know the Self, travel along that-path to paradise,
liberated after this embodiment. upwSSw^
They that follow after- illusion enter thick darkness;
they that satisfy themselves with liturgic knowledge, a
thicker darkness still.
" Those, spheres ■ are joyless, overspread with thick
darkness;—to. those go after death those infatuated men
tnat have no real knowledge.
" If a mean know himself, that he is this universal spirit,
what can he want, what can he crave, that he should
go tbrougb-the feverishness of a fresh embodiment?
He whose bouI is found, is gazed upon by him,
amid this’ wild of troubles,—he is the maker of all
things, the maker of the world; the world is his, for he
is the world.
“ Being hero, we know this, and if we did not know
■it, it would be a great perdition:
** They that know this become immortal, others pass
On again to misery.
" When he sees this Self aright, the luminous essence,
the lord of all that- has been, all that shall he, there is
nothing that he shrinks from.
** That outside of which, day after day, the year rolls
round,—that the gods adore, as the light of’ lights, as
length of life undying.
" That over which the five orders of living things,1
•mid over whieh .the ether is outspread,—that do I know
to he myself, the universal Seif,—even I the Bsge im¬
mortal
“ They that know tne breath of the breath, the eye
of the'eye, the ear of the ear, the thought of the thought.
1 Hie five tribes of men. S«e ftbove, j>. 14.
 «4 THE PHILOSOPHY

Cur. BL —they have seen the Self primeval, that has bean £xm
- all time.
“ It is to be seen only with the mind: there is no*
thing in it that is manifold.
“ From death to death he goes who looks on this sat
manifold.
“ It is to be seen in one way only, it is indemon1
atrafcle, immutable. The Self is unsullied, beyond the
expanse,1 unborn, infinite, imperishable.
“ Let the patient Brahman know that, and learn
wisdom. Let him not learn many words,8 for that is a
weariness of the voice.
“ Ibis is indeed the great unborn Self. This has the
form of conscious life, amidst the vital airs, dwelling in
the ether in the heart; the ruler of all things, iord of all
things, king of all things. It becomes nor greater by
good works, no less by evil works. This is the lord of
all, the lord of living things, the upholder of living
things. This is the bridge that spans the spheres, *
they may not fall the one into the other. This it is
that the Brahmans seek after in reciting the Veda.
“By sacrifice, by almsgiving, by self-inflicted pains,
by fasting, if he learns this, a man becomes a quietist.
This it is that the holy mendicants long for, in setting
out upon their wanderings. Teaming after this it was.
that the wise men of old desired no offspring, saying.
What have we to do with, children, we to whom belong
.Hus Self, this spiritual sphere? They arose and for-
sopk the desire of children, of wealth, of worldly exist-
enee, and set out upon their life of wandering. , For
'the wish for children is the wish for wealth, and the
vdsh for wealth is the wish for worldly existence^ and
ifaflre fire both of these desires,
“This same Self is not this, not that: it is impal-

tkOtunL
 OF THE UPANISH4DS. 65.

pable, tor it cannot be handled; undecaying, for it n»n m

waste not away; unattached, for it has no ties-; invul-
actable, for it is not hurt by the sword or slain. Things
done'and things left undone cross not over to it It
passes beyond both the thought that it has done evil,
and the thought that it has done good. That which it
has done, and that which it has failed to do, afflict it
not
“ Therefore it has been said in a sacred verse: This,
the eternal greatness of the sage that knows Brahman,
becomes not greater by works, and becomes not lesser,
let him learn the nature of that greatness. He that
knows it is no longer sullied by evil acts. Checking
his senses, quiescent, passionless, ready to suffer all
things,'fixed in ecstasy, he sees Within himself the Self,
he sees the" universal soul. Imperfection crosses not
over to him, he crosses beyond imperfection, he burns
up all his imperfections. He that knows Brahman
becomes free from imperfections, free from doubt, en¬
sphered in Self.
"This same great unborn Self is undecaying, un¬
dying, imperishable, beyond all fear. The Self is
beyond all fear. He that knows this becomes the Self
beyond all fear.”
The imperfections beyond which the sage of perfect TbepotMt
insight, living" in the body but already free from fur- toasaani**
ther transmigration, has passed, are merit and demerit,Uw*
the fruits of good and evil works, which serve alike
only to prolong metempsychosis. Good works as wsll
as evil are, from the higher point of view, an evil to be
shunned, as they protract the migrations of the souL
It is not exertion, but inertion, and a perfect inertion,
that is the path to liberation. The sage is beyond all
fear, as already one with the one and' only Self, and
free from the fear of misery in new embodiments. He
may, , as we have seen that jtuandagiri says, do good
and evil for the rest of his days, as he pleases, and
 66 THE PHILOSOPHY

Pm*, m, incur no stain. Everything that he has done And

-everything that he is doing, all his works, save only
thrift that are resulting in his experiences in his pte-
sent body, are burnt up in the fire of spiritual intuition.
Anri therefore in the Taittirlya Upanishad we read,
“ The thought no longer tortures him, What good have
I left undone, what evil done ? ” And in another pas¬
sage of the Byihadaranyaka: “ Here the thief is a thief
no more, the Chan&ala1 a Chandala no more, the
Paulkasa1 no more a Paulkasa, the sacred mendicant
no more a sacred mendicant: they are no longer fol¬
lowed by good works,, they are no longer followed- by
evil works. Tor at last the sage has passed through
all the sorrows of .his heart.” At the height reached
by the self-tormenting sage, at last Arrived at insight
into and re-union with the one and only Self, there is
no' longer any distinction of personality; and At this
height of insight and re-union, saint and sinner, the
holy Brahman and the impure alien and the degraded
outcast, are all one in the unity, of characterless
being. The objection is obvious that this doctrine is
immoral, and the objection has been foreseen and met.
The reply is that the theosophist has had to go through
a process of initiatory virtues, in order to purify his
mind for the quest of reality and escape from further
misery, and that after he has attained his end, and is
one with the one and only Self, these virtues will ad¬
here to him as habits, so far as others are . concerned
for to himself they are unrealities like all things else
excepting Brahman. This is the reply of Hpsimhasa-
rasvatl towards the end of the SubodhinI, an exposition
of the Yedantasara.
Batwfli nct “ Some one may urge: It will not surely follow from
wj, ti»» this that the living yet liberated sage may act as he
liitMiihn chooses. We cannot allow this to be urged. It esn-
wum.** not be denied that the perfect sage may $ct as he
1 Degraded taffigenea or outcast* from the Hindu pah.
 OF THE VPANISHADS. 67

pleases, in the presence of such texts, traditions, and chup. nr.

arguments as the following:—‘Not by Trilling his —
mother, nor by killing his father/ ‘ He that does not
mistake not-Self for Self, whose inner vision is unsul¬
lied,—he, though he kills these people, neither IHlla
them hpr is killed/ ‘ He that knows the truth is sul¬
lied peither by good actions nor by evil actions/ * If
he sees the unity of all things, he is unaffected alii™
whether he offer a hundred horse-sacrifices Or kill hun¬
dreds of holy Brahmans.’ ‘ Sages act in various ways,
good and bad, through the influence of the acts of for¬
mer lives now. at work in shaping their acts and their
experiences in their present embodiment/ If then you
say that we teach that a perfect -sage may do what he
likes, it is true we do teach this, but as these texts are
only eulogistic of the liberated sage, it is not intended
that he should act at random. As a great teacher says,
‘Ignorance arises from evil-doing, and wilful action
from ignorance: how can this wilful action, this dcdng
as one likes, result from good works, when the good
works pass away ? * The preliminary acquirements of-
the aspirant to extrication from metempsychosis, his
humility, sincerity, tenderness towards every form of
sentient life, stick to him like so many ornaments, even
after the rise of this-spiritual intuition.”
The repetition of the sacred syllable Om is said to Ttynyrtb
conduct the slow aspirant to a gradual and progressive »j
liberation from metempsychosis. Om is a solemn, affir¬
mation, Tes. It is regarded by the Indian sages as made
up of the three letters A, u, m, in euphonic combina¬
tion. This mystic Syllable Om is said to be the nearesG
similitude of Brahman;1 -it is an image of th®'Self,
as the black ammonite serves instead of an iinage of
VisbQu.* It is said to include all speech; and as names
are•& some way one and the same as the things they
name, it is one with all things, one with Brahman., In
1 Brakmaw nedisAfktm prattlam. . * Ufalagr&aa.
 68 ■THE PHILOSOPHY

Our. in, the Fralna Upanishad the great teacher Pippalida says,
“This syllable Om is the higher and the ltfwer Brad¬
man.” That is to say, Om is Brahman ass uneOhg&>
tioned, and Brahman in fictitious manifestation as f$e
Deniiurgus. In their exposition of this passage the
scholiasts say that the Self, as characterless and super*
. sensible, cannot be made an object to the thinking
faculty, unless this faculty be previously purified by
meditation on the mystic Om, taken and devoutly iden¬
tified with Brahman, as a man may take an image and
devoutly identify it with Vishnu. Upon the mjnd
thus purified the Self shines of itself, undifierenoed.
The following verses of the Taittirlya Upanishad are
an invocation of this sacred utterance:—
i«Too»ttonof “May that Indra, Om, that is the highest thing in
xSttbtp the Vedas, that is all that is immortal, above the im-
Vfuduud. mortality of the Vedas, may that divine being strengthen
me with wisdom.
“Let me, O god, become a holder of immortality.
Let my body become able, my tongue mellifluous. Let
me hear much with my ears. Thou art the sheath of
Brahman, only obscured by oartlily wisdom. Preserve
in me what I have heard. That prosperity which
brings, and adds, and quickly provides raiment and
cattle and meat and drink at all times,—that prosperity
bring thou to me. Wealth woolly with flocks: SvShfiJ*
Let sacred students come to me: flfvihi. Let sacred
students repair to me: SvShS. Let ms become a glory
among men: Svaha. 0 holy one, let me enter into
thee: Svaha. In thee, with thy thousand branches, let
me become pur^: Svaha.
“ As the waters flow downwards, as the months pass
away into the year, even so let the sacred Btudents
come to me. 0 maker, let them come in from every
ride: Sviba. Thou art the refuge. Give me thy fight.
Beceive me into thyself.”
1 Atftoti an exclamation made in invocations of the
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 69

The mystic import of Om, and the nature of the three Chat, iil
States of the soul, above which the aspirant to extrica-
tion is to.rise, and the fourth or undifferenced state of
the $elf one and the same in all souls, into which he is
to. rise, are set forth in the Mandukya Upanishad, one
of the Upanishads of the Atharvaveda. This Upanishad
is as follows:—
4*Qm. . * This syllable is all: Its interpretation is that The ut^nk-
which has been, that which is, and that which is to be.
• All is Om, and only Om, and whatever is beyond trinal «5Wsof
time is Om, and only Uin. in& dreaming.
« For all this world is Brahman, this Self is Brahman, deepTlmdin
and this same Self has four quarters. pm seif.
“The first quarter is the soul in the waking state,'rhemUag
externally cognitive, with seven members, with nineteen ******
inlets, with fruition of the sensible, the spirit of waking
souls, VaiSvanara.”
In the ascending order the first state of the Self, after
it has passed into a fictitious plurality of migrating
souls, is its waking state in the gross body, in which it
stands face to face with outward things. Yailvanara
or Purusha, the spirit that permeates all living bodies,
iq aai'd to have seven members; the sky is his head, the
sun is his eye, the air is his breath, the ethereal ex¬
panse is his body, the food-grains are his bladder, the
earth is his feet, the sacrificial fire is his mouth. The
TrfnAteflti inlets of the waking soul are the five organs
of ffanafl the five organs of motion, the five vital airs,1
the common sensory, the intellect, the self-assertive,
and the memorial faculties. The individual embodied
1 The five organa of Benae are organa are the common ae&Borj,
those of hearing, touch, sight, manat; intellectthe
taste, and smell. The five organs self-assertive, ahankdra ; and the
of motion are those of speech, memorial, chitta. These organs
handling, locomotion, excretion, are made up of the elements as
and generation. The five vital yet in a supersensible condition,
aim are that of respiration, the the dements becoming sensible
'descending, the permeating, the only after a procesa of concretion,
aaoending, and the assimilative technically known as qumtuplica-
vital ajrs. The four internal tion, panchffatrana.
 7© THE PHILOSOPHY

chaf. III. soul is termed Vi£va, the sum of embodied souls Vai£-
vanara.
Th* diMmisg “ The second Quarter is the soul in the dreaming
***** state, with seven members, with nineteen inlets with
fruition of the ideal—the dreaming spirit.”
In the dreaming state, Sankaracbarya says, the senses
are at rest, but the conunou sensory proceeds to work,
and the images, painted upon it like pictures on a canvas,
simulate the outward objects of the waking experiences.
The common sensory is set in motion in this way by
the illusion, the desires and the retributive fatality,
which cling to the soul, through all its migrations.
The individual sleeping soul is styled Taijasa, the sum
of sleeping souls in their invisible bodies is Hirapya-
garbha.
fhtjjfataot « Dreamless sleep is that state in whin the sleeper
*9 desires no desire and sees no dream. The third quarter -
is the soul in the state of dreamless sleep, being one in
itself, a mass of cognition, pre-eminent in bliss, with
fruition of beatitude^ having thought as its inlet; and
of transcendent knowledge.”
In dreamless sleep the soul is said to be one in itself,
the unreal duality of the waking and the dreaming
consciousness having melted away into unity. The
soul is, in this state, also said to be a mass Of cognition,
as it for the time reverts to its proper nature as undif¬
ferenced thought. All things become one, as in a dark
night the whole outlook is one indistinguishable blur.
The soul is now pre-eminent in bliss, as no longer
exposed to the varied miseries that arise from the ficti¬
tious semblances of duality, yet it is not yet pure bliss
itself; for the state of dreamless sleep is not abiding.
The individual soul in this state'is styled PrajAa, trans¬
cendent in knowledge, and the sum of such souls is
Iivsra, the arch-illusionist, the world-projecting, deity.
The mvohiertm of the soul at this stage is the beatific
vesture, and the counterfeit presentment .or body of
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 7i

I^vafa is the body out of which all things emanate, the nw*»- in.
cosmi al illusion. The soul is not yet at rest. As ~r~
Anandagiri says,-“It cannot be admitted that in this
dreamless sleep the transcendently cognitive soul is in
perfect and unmingled bliss, for it is still connected
with the world-fiction. If it were not so, the sleeper
would he already released from further migration) and
he Could, not rise up again as he does to fresh experi¬
ences.” The soul is not at rest till it has reached its
final extrication from metempsychosis. To return to
the Maudukya.
“ This Self is the lord of all, this the internal ruler,
this the source of all things; this is’ that out of which
all things proceed, and into which they shall pass back
again.
“ Neither internally cognitive nor externally cogni- m* «ufa> of
tive, nor cognitive both without and within; not
mass of cognition, neither cognitive nor incognitive, 8,tt
invisible, intangible, characterless, unthinkable, un¬
speakable; to be reached only by insight into the
oneness of all spirits; that into which the world
passes away, changeless, blessed, above duality;—syich
do they hold the fourth to be. That is Self. That is
to be known.”
To cite a few remarks of the scholiasts. The pure
Self, the fourth and only real entity, is that in the
place of which the fictitious world presents itself to the
uninitiated, as the fictitious serpent presents itself in
place of a piece of rope to the belated wayfarer. There
is something that underlies every such figment; it is
the sand of the desert that is overspread by the waters
of the mirage, it is -the shell that is fictitiously replaced
by seeming silver, it is a distant post that in the dusk
is mistaken for a man, and bo on. Thus illusion every¬
where points to a reality beyond itself. The three
so-called quarters of Brahman previously spoken of,
only fictitiously present themselves in place of the sole
 n THE PHILOSOPHY

Gbap. III. reality, the fourth. They are principles that emanate,
and out of which other principles emanate. May^
the world-fiction, is the seed, and its figments, the ele¬
ments and elemental products, are the growing wcrld-
tree. The fourth, the Self, does not emanate from
anything, nor does anything (save fictitiously) emanate
from' it; it is neither seed nor tree. -It is unthinkable
and unspeakable, to be enounced only in negations.1
It is absolute. The world does not emanate from, but
fictitiously presents itself in place of, Brahman.
Literal ftnaly- “ This snnm Self is exhibited in the mystic syllable.
fUotOx.
Om is exhibited in letters. The quarters are the letters,
and the letters are the quarters,—the letter A, the letter
u, and the letter M.
“ The first letter, the letter A, is Yaiivanara, the spirit
of waking souls in the waking world, because it per¬
meates all utterance, because it has a beginning. He
that knows this attains to all desires, and becomes the
first of all men.
“ The second letter, the letter u, is Taijasa, the spirit
of dreaming souls in the World of dreams, because this
letter is more excellent^ or because it is the intermediate
letter. He that knows this elevates the train of his
ideas, becomes passionless; there is none in his family
that knows hot Brahman.
" The third letter,, the letter u, is Prajha, the spirit of
■laapifig and undreaming souls, because it comprehends
the other two, because the other two proceed out of it.
He that knows this comprehends all things, and becomes
the- source of things.
" The fourth is not & letter, but the whole syllable
Om, unknowable, unspeakable, into which the whole
world passes away, blessed, above duality. He himself
by hiingelf enters into the Self,—he that knows this,
that knows this”1
1 MMMriniM tawwrtfewA * The repetition here *ael»ewhere
wiMinli) Anundegiri maria the doaeuf the UpaniihaiL
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 73

The Mandukya Upanishad is thus an exposition of chap. in.

the S nificance of the sacred syllable On*, of the three The defame
unreal states, and of the one real state of Brahman.
The several vestures or irmlwra of the migrating souls taSghtlutha
■ in the ascending order; the mode in which they and u^^Sd.
their spheres of migration emanated out of Brahman
overspread with Maya; and the scale of beatitudes by
which the soul may re-ascend to its fontal essence, the
one and only Self, are the themes of the second and
third sections, the Brahmanandayalll and the Bhriguvalll
of the Taittinya Upanishad. This Upanishad belongs,
as its name imports, to the so-called Black Becension of
the Yajurveda, From the first section, the ^ikshavalll,
treating of the initiation and purification of the aspirant
to release from metempsychosis, the hymn to Om has
been already presented to the reader. The scale of
beatitudes the soul may mount by, is given in the
same words also in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad.
The second and third sections of the Taittirlya are not
so engaging .and impressive as many portions of the
Upanishads are; but as they contain many of the texts
of most frequent occurrence in the records of Indian
philosophy, a translation is subjoined. One of these’
texts occurs in the opening lines of the second section,
the Brahmanandavalll, which is as follows
“ Hari.1 Om. May he preserve Us both, may he TheBn*m#n-
reward us both. May we put forth our strength to-nooDd»ction
gether, and may that which we recite be efficacious. uHyaUpuu-
May we never feel enmity against each other. Om.®11®4
Peace, peace, peace.”
This is an invocation on the part of the teacher and
his disciple, to remove any possible obstacles to the cwn-
.munication and acquisition of the traditional science
of Brahman. The preserver and reoompenser is the
universal soul or Demiurgus.
“ He that knows Brahman attains the ultimate reality.
1 Hari is a name of Visbyu.
 74 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. in. Therefore this sacred verse has been pronounced: Truth,
knowledge, infinite, is Brahman. He that know this
Self seated in the cavity in the highest ether, has fruition
of all desires at one and the same moment by meajas of
the omniscient Self.”
The Sctf U The scholiasts tell us that the word ether is here
within the
mind, inside another name for the world-fiction, as it is also in the
the heart of
text of the Brihadaranyaka: “ Over this imperishable
principle the ethereal expanse is woven warp and
woof.” The cavity is the mind, so called because
knowledge, the subject knowing and the thing known,
are contained in it, or because implication in metemp¬
sychosis and extrication from it depend upon it The
migrating soul is nothing else than the one and only
Self fictitiously limiting itself to this or that individual
mind; every individual mind being, equally with its
successive environments, an emanation of the cosmical
illusion. He that sees through the illusion the Self
within his mind, enters into the fulness of undifferenced
beatitude. He has every form of happiness at one
and the same moment,' not a successioU of pleasures
through this or that avenue of sense; such pleasures
are mere products of the retributive fatality that pro¬
longs the migration of the soul. The highest abn of
all is to pass beyond such experiences to the further
shore of union with Brahman, the fulness of bliss; to
refdnd the personality of the migrating soul into the
impersonality of the Self exempt from the experiences
of metempsychosis. The' aspirant to release from misery
must learn that he and all other individuals are but par¬
ticular and local manifestations of the universal soul;
and that the universal soul, the Jagadatman, is the one
and only Self veiled beneath the self-feigning world-
fiction,’' and thus conscious of a seeming twofold order
of subjects and objects. The world-fiction is made .up
of the sum of pleasures, pains, and indolences, the three
prtmordia rerwn of Indian cosmology. As soon as he
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 75

recognises his true nature he snail repossess'it, and on chap. hi.

the ise of spiritual intuition the world of semblances The ^uiis the
shall dissolve and pass away. The soul is already the
characterless being, the pure thought, the undifferenced ^tobethc
bliss—how can it be said to regain it, to recover that
which it already is ? It recovers it by seeing it, by
knowing it. In its everyday life the soul has lost
itself by identifying itself with, what it is not, with
its temporal vestures, its fictitious envelopments.
Nrisimhasarasvatl teaches us that the soul seeking
to find itself in the impersonal Unity of the Self, is
like a man looking for a necklace he thinks that he
has lost and suffers from the logs of, the necklace
being all the time about his neck. Terrified at the
miseries that await his soul in its migrations, he is
only trembling at his own shadow, for these miseries
are unreal. His affliction ceases as soon as he learns
what he truly is; his fear3 cease as soon as he learns the
unreality of everything that only seems to he. To the
highest point of view won by abstraction pursued to
its last limit, the implication of the soul, and its re¬
lease, in and from metempsychosis, are unreal, mere
figments of the cosmic fiction. To return to the text:—
“ Out of this same Self the ether rose, from ether air, Probation ot
from air fire, from fire water, from water earth, from meats, sad
earth plants, from plants food, from food the germ of plication or
life, from tlie germ of life mao. This is mas as made tSL
sp of the extractive matter of food.”
Such are the five elements’in their progressive con¬
cretion as they emanate from Brahman overspread with
Jd'aya- Ether comes first with its single property of
sound: it is the soniferous element, and in it all finite
things exist. From ether the atmosphere proceeds,
with the property of ether and with a superadded pro¬
perty of its own, namely, tangibility. Thus air has two
properties. From air comes fire with the properties
of ether and air, sound and tangibility, and with a
 76 THE PHILOSOPHY

chap, in. superadded property, of its own, namely, colour. Thus

— fire has three properties. From fire proceeds ater
■with the properties of ether, air, and fire, and^ with a
superadded property of its own, namely, taste. Tims
water has four properties. From water emanates earth
with the properties of ether, air, fire, and water, and
with a superadded property of its own, namely, odour.
Thus earth has five properties. It is Brahman-as illu¬
sively overspread with Maya, that .manifests itself in
this progressive concretion of the elements and of
elemental things; and it is into Brahman that by a
regressive process of abstraction the whole series may
be made to disappear. Man in his visible and earthly
body is made up of the materials of food. Man here
stands for the whole scale of animal life, as being the
highest representative, and alone capable of the worship
of the.gods and the knowledge of the sole reality that
ibaBnta&d “ veiled beneath the world. The earthly body is the
first of the five vestures of the sonl in order of ascent
Sn&bSay. to the fontal essence: it is the nutrimentitious involur
cnm. Each lower is to be resolved into each higher
garment of the aoul, by a progressive insight into the
fictitious nature of them all, till the aspirant passes
through the last, the so-called beatific vesture, to the
Belf within. We are told that he is to strip every
wrapper off himself one by one, as he might peel off
the4successive shells -of a grain of rice. The several
portions of the outermost shell bf the soul, the earthly
body, are next described in grotesque similitude to the
parts of a bird;—
“ Of this, this head is the head, this right arm is the
right wing, this left arm the left wing, this trunk is the
body, this nether part the tail, the prop. Therefore there
is this memorial verse: It is food that living creatures
spring from, all they that dwell upon the earth. They
live by food, and at the last they pass into food again,
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 77

for food is the earliest of creatures. Therefore food is Coat. ill.

eaT tine panacea.”

Thebody dies and restores its elements to the earth,
out of which they reappear in fresh vegetable forms,
to supply food again to animals and men—ah Indian
statement of the circulation of matter.
“ See dying ■vegetables life sustain,
See life dissolving vegetate again:
All forms that perish other forms supply,
By turns we catch the vital breath and die!—
Like bubbles, on the sea of matter borne,
They rise and break, and to that sea return.”

Pood, fsankaracharya Bays, is called the panacea, as

quenching .the burning of the body,1 that is, as repair¬
ing the waste of the system. It is a standing rule of
Indian philosophy that everything passes back into
that out of which it came. The body came out of, was
made out of food, and it passes back into the form
of food. To proceed with the text. Every item of
knowledge. !s promised its proportionate reward, and
so we read:—
“They that meditate upon food as Brahman obtain
all b~-nda of food. For food is the earliest of created
things, and it' is called the panacea: From food all
creatures aTe horn, and after birth they grow by food.
It is eaten by them, and it eats them, and therefore it.
is called food.”
Animals.are said to he eaten by food, in one of theroato
rude metaphors so frequent in the Upanishads, because tea.SrtMhto
the elements of their bodies after dissolution enter into
the forms of vegetable life. The aspirant,is now sup- rotter-'—
posed to have seen into the unreality of the food-made
body, and to have made it to disappear by an effort of
abstraction. He is now called upon to dissolve the
vesture next within, the so-called vesture of the vital

x Sarvauthadham, urvajirininiJ^ dehaddiapraiaiMmaM ■ arnmn

Hf'h.urtiA.
 78 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. iii. airs. This vesture is invisible, and one of the three
factors of the invisible migrating body, the tenuous
involucrum, the other two being the sensorial §.nd the
cognitional vestures. The body has been got rid of,
the vesture of vital airs must next be put away.
Thtuoond “Within this same body made of the extractive
<rfthe matter of food, there is another and interior body, made
vital am. of the vital airs, and with that the outer body iS filled
up. This interior body is also in the shape of man,
fashioned after the human shape of the outer body.
Of this interior body the breath is the head, the per¬
vading air is the right wing, the descending air is
the left wing, ether is the trunk, and earth is the tail,
the prop. Therefore there is this memorial verse:
It is 'breath that gods breathe, and men, and cattle,
for the breath is the life of living things. Therefore it
is called the life of all They that meditate upon
breath as Brahman live the full life of man. This
body of vital air is embodied within the food-made
body.”
Axiimals, and men, and gods live in the outer body
by virtue of an inner body made of the breath of life.
To this inner body there is another, the sensorial body,
which fills it up; to that another, the cognitional; to
that another, the beatific. They are all alike permeated
and animated by the universal Self, their true being,
everlasting, -unchanging, beyond the five vestures.
Meditation upon the vesture of vital air is rewarded
with length of life, according to the maxim that the
votary is assimilated to that manifestation under which
he meditates upon the Self. This second wrapper being
opened and laid aside by meditative abstraction, the
sage proceeds to the third or sensorial vesture of his
80ul,
n»aba-rc*- “ Within this same body of the airs of life there is
tec’rffeT*' another inner body made of the common sensory, and
vnmmonMa. -yjth this the vesture of tiie vital airs is filled. This
 OF THE VPANISHADS. 79
also is in the shape of man, fashioned after the human Chap, in
shap of the vesture of vital airs. Of this sensorial ~'
body the Yajush is the head, the Rik is the right wing,
the Saman the left wing, the Brahmanas the trunk,
and the Atharvangirasa the tail, the prop. Therefore
there is this memorial verse: From which words turn
back with the thinking faculty, not reaching it; he
that knows the bliss of the Self is for ever free from
fear. This sensorial body is embodied in ihe body of
vital airs.”
After stripping off this wrapper in his quest of the
reality hidden within, the aspirant proceeds to the
fourth vesture of the migrating soul, its garment of in¬
tellect or cognition.
“Within this same sensorial body there is another Th« fourth"
interior body, the cognitional body, and with this the mSSior"
sensorial body is filled. This also is in the shape of 52£S!Cn“1
man, fashioned after the human shape of the sensorial
vesture. Of this cognitional body faith is the head,
justice the right wing, truth the left wing, ecstasy the
trunk, the intellect the tail, the prop. Therefore there
is this memorial verse: It is knowledge that lays out
the sacrifice and performs the rites. All the gods
meditate upon knowledge as the earliest manifestation
of the Self. If a man learn that knowledge is the Self,
and swerves not from that, he has fruition of all desires
after leaving his imperfections in the body. This same
cognitional vesture is embodied in the sensorial body.”
The aspirant, after laying aside the first wrapper, is
free from the body; after laying aside the second, third,
and fourth, he is free from the invisible body, the tenuous
invducrym, which clothes the soul in its migration
from body to body. Passing beyond the visible and
the invisible body, he arrives at the last vesture of the
spirit, the beatific involucmm, that clothes the sleeping'
but undreaming soul.
“ Within this same c'ognitional body there is another.
 So the philosophy

Chap. hi. an inner body, the blissful body, and with this the

Theifthand cognitional body is filled. This also is in the shape of

tna", fashioned after the human shape of the cognitional
body. Of this blissful vesture tenderness is the head,
Splits joy is the right wing, rejoicing the left wing, bliss the
trunk, and Brahman is the tail, the prop. Therefore
deep- there is this memorial verse: If- a man think that the
Self is not, he becomes .as if he were not: if he knows
that the Self ts, then they know that he is indeed.
This same blissful vesture is embodied in the cogni¬
tional body.”
This blissful vesture of the soul reposing in dreamless
sleep is not Brahman, but it has Brahman beneath it
as its prop or -basis. In this vesture the soul that
sleeps without dreaming is for the time at one with
Brahman, and all the duality projected by>illusion is
for the time at an end in the pure unity of the Self.
This is the last vesture to be laid aside in order to
reach the ultimate truth within.
So far the doctrine of the five vestures of the
migrating soul1 has been propounded in the text of
this Upanishad. A similar tenet makes its appearance
in the philosophy of the neo-Platonists. Thus Produs
teaches that even before it comes into the world the
soul must have animated a body, just as the daemons •
and deities are embodied souls. This body is imma¬
terial and ethereal, and emanates, like the soul itself,
out of the DemiuTgus. Produs places between this
immaterial body and the earthly body a series of other
imminent, which come with it into the world, dothe it
after death, and accompany it in its migrations so long
as it remains in the phenomenal order of things.
The Brahmanandavalll proceeds to represent the
disdple as asking his teacher who it is .that is to
attain to re-nnion with the one and only Self The
emanation of elements and elemental things front
1 PanchaJtoskavid^d.
 OF THE UP4NISHAVS. Si

Brahman and Maya, and the fire wrappers of the soul, csaf. nt
are scatters that relate to the ordinary man and to'the
sage, alike: is the. re-union.with the. fontal essence open
to. both alike ? The text proceeds:—>
“ After this arise thequesfcions: Does a man without
knowledge go after death to that veritable world ? or is
it only he that has knowledge, that .has fruition of that
veritable world 1 ”
The sequel of the Upanishad is the reply to these
questions. It is he only that surmounts the general
.illusion and sees the Self within by spiritual intuition,
that shall pass into the Self netfer to return. The
text first.-speaks of the creation of the wortd at the
opening of each aeon in the infinite series of seons, by
the fictitiously-conditioned Brahman,1 the Cosmic soul,
or Archimagus.
“He desired: Let me become many, let me pass into Bnimnibe-
plurality. He performed self-torture, and having per-
formed that self-torture,, projected out of himself all
this . world,' whatever is."
The notion of the creative action of the Demiurgus
here exhibited, is the same as that in the Nasadlyasfikta,
Higveda, x. 129, presented to the reader in the first
chapter of this work. As the Indian scholiasts say
that the words,.“It was not entity, nor Was it non¬
entity” in that hymn refer to Maya, so they also hold
that “ the one'that was void, covered with nothingness,"
which * developed itself by the power of self-torture,’*
is Brahman in its earliest manifestation, the illusory
creator, or Demiurgus, or soul of the universe. Tiie
passing t>f Brahman into the fictitious plurality of
the phenomenal world, is frequently spoken of ip the
Upanishads as the self-explication of Brahmsii under

1 We must be cautious not to Brahman fictitiously associated

refer- -what - is predicable only of with MfiyS, and thus the fictitious
Invars to Brahman per to. L&vara, creator of the fictitious world,
the Demiurgus or Archimagus, i*
F
 S* THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap, iil names and colours, that is to say, its manifestation

under visible and nameable aspects.1 Brabm n, the
one and only Self, when mirrored upon Maya, the
world-fiction, is that out of which the world 'ema¬
nates? The desires of this Demiurgus are the emana¬
tions ot the world-*fiction.* “His self-torture is a
figurative expression for his prevision of the world that
is to be; and after this prevision he projeots otlfc of
himself the world as it is to be experienced by migrat¬
ing souls, waking, dreaming, or in dreamless sleep, in
space and time, in name and colour,—a world that is
suitable to the residuary influence of the works of
those souls in the last aeon.” For it must always be
remembered that the series of worlds is without begin¬
ning, and that , every genesis is a palingenesis. To
proceed with the text:—
•"■Having evolved that world, he entered into it, and
having entered it, he became the limited and the un¬
limited, the definite and the indefinite, the receptacle
and not the receptacle, the living and the lifeless, the
true and the false; he became the true, for whatever is
they call the true. Therefore there is this memorial
verse: Non-existent was this in the beginning, from
that the existent proceeded. That made itself, and
therefore it is called self-made or holy.4 He is taste,
for on receiving taste a man becomes blissful. For
who could live, who could breathe if in this ether there
were not bliss 1 For he gives bliss; for when a man
finds a safe footing in this invisible, incorporeal, unde-
finable, ultimate principle, he arrives beyond all fear;
but when he admits even the smallest difference in
that principle, fear comes upon him. That very prin¬
ciple is a fear to the sage that views such difference.
Accordingly there is this memorial verse: In awe of

1 vyab€av$a. 5 ^aukarSch&rya's Commentary

* braJima on the Taittirlva Uptuiisbad,
jegatah barman, Anandagixi. 4 Sukrita,
 OF THE UPANISHADS. . *3

this the wind blows, in awe of this the sun rises; in Chat. iu.
awe nis speed Agni and Indra, and the Death-god
speeds oesides those other four.”
TKe universal soul enters into the ether in the heart
of every living thing, and there lodges in fictit " us limi¬
tation to each individual mind, like the ether one and
undivided in every jar and other hollow thing, or like
the one shn reflected upon every piece of water. Thus
lodged, it is many in the many that see, that hear, that
think, that know. It is the life of all. In saying that
this was non-existent in the beginning, the text .does
not deny that Brahman existed in the beginning, but
only that it existed in the fictitious modes of the
phantasmagoric, world. The text now presents the
scale of beatitudes in human and divine embodiments,
through which the migrating soul may remount on its
passage to the fontal unity of Self.
“There is the following computation of beatitude; Th0 Poale o£
let there- be a youth, a good youth, versed in the Veda,
an able teacher, hale and strong, and let the whole
earth, full of wealth, belong to him. This is one
human bliss. A hundred of these human beatitudes
are the one bliss of the man that has become.a Gand-
harva, and also of a sage learned in the Veda and un-
stricken with desire. A hundred of these beatitudes
of the map that has become a Gandharva, are the om
bliss of the divine Gandharvas, and also of a sage
learned in the Veda and unstricken with desire. A
hundred of these beatitudes of the divine Gandhar¬
vas, are the one bliss of the forefathers of the tribes
in theii! long-lasting sphere, and also of a sage learned
in the Veda and unstricken with desire. A hundred
of these beatitudes of the forefathers in tliefr long-
lasting sphere, are the one bliss of those born as gods
in the sphere of the gods, and also of a sage .learned in
the Veda and unstricken with desire. A hundred of
these beatitudes of those born as gods in the sphere of
 84 THB PHILOSOPHY

ck4lp.ul the gods, is the one bliss of those that have become
gods, having gone to the gods by means of S'Wrifice,
and also of a sage learned in the Veda and unstricken-
with desire. A hundred of these beatitudes of*£hose
that have become gods, is one bliss of the gods tkem-
selves? and also of a sage learned in the Veda and
unstricken with desire, A hundred of these beati¬
tudes of the gods is the one bliss of Indra, and also of
a Sage learned in the Veda and unstricken with desire.
A hundred of these beatitudes of Indra is the one bliss
of Brihaspati,1 and also of a sage learned in the Veda
and unstricken with desire. A hundred of these beati¬
tudes of Bjrihaspati is the one bliss of, Praj&pati,2 * and
also of a sage learned in the Veda and unstricken with
desire. A hundred of these beatitudes of Prajapati is
the one bliss of Brahma,* and also of the sage learned in
the-Veda* and unstricken with, desire. It is the same
universal soul4 that is in the soul and that is in the sun.
“ He that knows this turns his back upon the world,
passes through this, food-made body, passes through'
this body of the vital airs, passes through this sensorial
body, passes through this cognitional body, and passes
through this beatific body. Therefore there is this
memorial verse: It is the Self from.which words turn
back with the mind, not reaching it; he that knows
the bliss of the Self no longer fears anything. He is
no longer tortured with the thought. What good thing
have I left undone, what evil have I done ? When he
knows this, these two, the good and the evil, strengthen
his spirit^ for both are only Self.5 These two only
strengthen his spirit when he knows this. Such is the
mystic doctrine.’*

1 The spiritual teacher of the 1 That is, the good and the ^vil
gods. things that he has done are now
* PrajSpatt is the same as Pn* seen by'him to have been only
rosha, Vnftj, or Va&vsnara. fictitious manifestation* 6f the
* Brahms is Hiranyagarbha. one and only Self.
4 The Demiurgns,
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 85

fhe aspirant on his way to liberation Pf'sfes through charJH

and beyond all finite and local phases of bliss, into t e
pure, undifferenced beatitude, in which there is no
longer the distinction of subject and object* He enters
into the beatitude beyond duality; and good and evil
for him have lost their sting, the power0* ^'’ing ns®
to the miseries of fresh embodiments. Bnriguva i
opens and closes with the same invocatiP** as that pre¬
fixed to the BrahmanandavallL It treats of self-torture
stod of meditation on the fjve wrappers 801®» 88
subsidiary to the knowledge of Brahruafl*
" Hari, On. May he preserve ns both, may nil), the third
reward us both. May we put forth oflr strength^ to- tUe
gethef, and may what we recite be efficacious, may.ui*m»
we never feel enmity against each other. Om. Peace,
peace, peace. , , ,
" Bhfign, the son of Yaruiia, approached his-father
and said. Sir, teach me about Brahma®* “"lcr
said this to him: Pood, breath, eye, <*#> the thuikUlg
organ, speech.” . , .
Varupa is said to be here enumerating J-he seve
avenues to the knowledge of Brabm^> ®®e
food, i.e., the outer body, the breath witbin, an wi n
that the organs of sense and motion, _QE°
the cognitional and sensorial vestures of ® 80 _
“And again he said to him: Seek to ^now . thefawwMge
a which these Bring things ^ !»*$
live when they have come forth, ana ^ ' n»a.
pass again and re-enter: that is Brahma0-*. °
tised self-suppression, and npon
tot food isBiaBman, in that all tW**
toe from food, lire by food , when O-V**™
to pass back into and re-enter «°oi to fau,er«~»!-w.
Alter learning tins ne came *» Brahman. HeB»hm»B.
Varuna and saad Sir teach me abo* b lf
said to him, Seek to know Brahmanpractised ses¬
sion : self-suppression is Brahman. * r
 $6 • THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. IIL suppression, and upon performing it perceived that

vital air is Brahman, inasmuch as all these living
things proceed from vital air, live "by vital air, and
pass back' and re-enter vital air.”
The self-torture1 or self-suppression prescribed as
introductory to the knowledge of Brahman, is a pro¬
longed effort to annul the individual consciousness, to
put away sense ’ and thought, desire and will. It con¬
sists in the fixation of the muscles, the senses, and the
intellect, with a view to riveting the senses and the
thought upon one single object.
Third step. "Upon learning this he again came to his father
The oonmion
sensory is Varuna and said. Sir, teach me about Brahman, He
Brahman.
said to him. Seek the knowledge of Brahman by self¬
suppression: self-suppression is Brahman. He prac¬
tised self-suppression, and on practising it learned that
the common sensory is Brahman, inasmuch as all these
living things issue out of, live by, and return into the
common sensory.
Fourth step.
The mind is
"After learning this Jie again came to his father
Brahman. Varuna and said, Sir, teach me about Brahman. He
said to him. Seek the knowledge of Brahman by self¬
suppression; self-suppression is Brahman. He prac¬
tised* self-suppression, and on practising it perceived that
cognition is Brahman, inasmuch as all these living things
issue out of cognition, live by it, and pass back into it.
Fifth step. “ Upon learning this he again came to his father
The bliss of
Varuna and said. Sir, teach me about Brahman. He
sleep is Breh-
said to him, Seek the knowledge of Brahman by self-
suppression: self-suppression is Brahman. He prac¬
tised self-suppression, and on practising it perceived
that bliss is Brahman, inasmuch as all these living
things issue out of bliss, live upon it, pass hack into it.
This is the science that Varuna imparted and Bhyigu
received, a science made perfect in the supreme ether
1 Topaz. Tack tha tapo rahftn- chendfiydn&in chaikaLgryam para•
taklxtranasamddfidnam, mawtat mam, iapah, &ankarach£rya/
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 87

in the heart. He that knows this is made perfect; he chap, xil

beco* rich .in food, an eater of food; he becomes
great in offspring, in flocks, and herds, and spiritual
powei ■; he becomes great in fame. Let him never find
fault with food: that is his observance. The vital air
is food. The body is the eater of that food. The outwaniov
body is based on vital air, and vital air is based on the the meditating
body, and thus food is based on food. He that knows regards,
this food based on food is made perfect; he becomes
rich in food, an eater of food; he becomes rich in
offspring, flocks and herds, and spiritual power; he
becomes great in fame.
“ Let him never despise food: that is his observance.
Water is food, light is the eater of that food. Light is
based on water, and water is based on light, and thus
food is based on food. He that knows this food based
on food is made perfect; he becomes rich in food, an
eater of food; he beeomes rich in offspring, flocks and
herds, and spiritual power, and rich in fame,
“ Let him make much of food; that is his observance.
Earth is food, ether is the eater of that food. Ether is
based on earth, and earth is based on ether, and thus
food is baaed on food. He that knows this food based
on food is made perfect; he becomes rich in food, an
eater of food; he becomes rich in offspring, in flocks
and herds, and spiritual power, and rich in fame.
« Let him forbid no man to enter his housethat is
his observance. Let him then store up food in what¬
ever way he can. They tell him that comes to the
house that his food is ready. If the food is given at
once, it shall be given at once to the giver; if it be
given later, it shall be given later to the giver; if it be
^ven only at the last, it shall be given only at the last
to the giver.
“Let Brahman be meditated on as that which isjg£*°1£,d*r
preservative in speech, as that which is acquisitive and
preservative in the ascending and descending vital airs, Brahman.
 88- THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap.in, as work in the hands,, as locomotion in the feet. These

are the meditations on the Self in man. . Now for its'
manifestations in the gods. It is fertility in the rain,
mightiness in lightning. It is wealth in flocks'and
herds; in the stars it'is light. It is offspring, immor¬
tality, beatitude. In the ether it is all -that is. Let
him meditate upon Brahman as the basis of all that is,
and he shall be .firmly based. Let him meditate upon
it as greatness, and he shall become great. Let him
meditate upon it as thought, and he shall become a
thinker. Let him meditate upon it as that which
overawes, and the things that he desires shall bow
before hint. Let him meditate upon it as powerful,
and he shall'become powerful. Let him meditate upon
it as that into which divine things die away, and his
enemies rad rivals shall perish, and his brother’s sons,
if they displease him, shall die. It is the same uni¬
versal spirit that is in the soul and that is in the sun.
*' knows this turns his back upon the world,
paf8eS fcIirough this food-made body, passes through
JEjSSJa ttis ^ of the yital passes through this sensorial
mniMimt body, passes through this cognitional body, and passes
through this beatific body. Expatiating through these
worlds, with food at will, and taking shapes at will, he
wAedkto is ever singing this song of universal unity: 0 wonder-
•n- ful> wonderful, wonderful I am food, I am food, I
am food-; I am the eater, I am the eater, I am the
eater; I am the transmuter of food into the eater, I
am the transmuter of food into the eater, I am the
transmuter of food into the eater. I am the first-born
of creation, earlier than the gods, the navel of immor¬
tality. He that gives me keeps me. I am the food
that eats the eater. I stand above every World, with
hght .as of the sun. He that knows this is all this.
Such is the mystic doctrine.
* Hari On. May he preserve us both, may he re-
1 Hiraoyagarbha.
 OF THE UPANISHAbS. «9

"ward us both. May we put forth our strength together, chap. in.
and y what we recite be efficacious. May we never
feel enmity against each other. Oiff. Peace, peace,
peace.”
In this song of universal unity the sage finds that he
is one with every manifestation of Brahman, from the
visible elemental things of the world of sense up to the
divine emanations Puruslia, Hiranyagarbha, and ISvara;
one also with the underlying reality, the one and only
Self. At this stage he is said to possess magical powers;
he can range at will from this world through the several
worlds of the deities, and assume what shapes he
pleases. A trace of illusion1 adheres to him at times,
so that he still sees the semblances of duality; he knows
himself to be the Self that is- in all things, and finds
that he possesses the wonder-working powers of the
Yogin or ecstatic seer; he can take upon himself any
shape, visible or invisible, from the least to the greatest,
and go where he chooses among the worlds of men and
gods, and is said figuratively to enjoy every form of
pleasure at one and the same moment. Thaumaturgy
is the gift of ecstasy. The epithets that Archer Butler
bestows upon the philosophy of Proclus are applicable
to the philosophy of ancient India. It is sublime and
it is puerile. It is marked at once by sagacity and by
poverty, by daring independence and by grovelling
superstition.
In the view of the Indian schoolmen, the greatest of
all th- texts of the Fpanishads is the text That art
thou, in tee sixth Prapathaka2 of the Chhandogya
TJpanishad. This is pre-eminently the Mahavakya, the
supreme erouncement. It is on the comprehension of
this tes£ that spiritual intuition* or ecstatic vision rises
in the purified intelligence of the aspirant to extrication
from metempsychosis. This text is the burden of the
instruction given by Aruni to his son, the pedantic and
1 Anandagiri »» &*»• * lecture. * Samyagdarktaa.
 96 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. in. .opinionated Svetaketu, already mentioned in the second

chapter of this work.
Tfce diajogne , w Rooted in the existent are all these created things,
avtu£^d huilt upon the real, based upon the real. It has been
aSSSSm said already how these divine elements heat, water,
upwris earth, in man are threefold.1 When a man is dying,
his speech passes into his inner sensory, his inner sen¬
sory into his vital breath, his vital breath into heat, his
heat into the supreme divinity. All this world is ani¬
mated by the supersensible. This is Teal, this is Self.
That art thou, Svetaketu. Hearing this, Svetaketu
spoke again : Teach me further, holy sir. Be it so, my
son, he replied.
Allegory of "As bees make honey, gathering into one mass, into
ju^SLdthounity, the sweet juices of various plants; as those
y* juices cannot distinguish themselves the onS from the
other, as the juices of this plane and that: so all these
creatures, though they are one in the real, know not
that they are one in the real. What they are severally
in this life, lion, or wolf, or boar, or worm, or moth, or
gnat, or musquito, that they become again and again.
All this world is animated by the supersensible. This
is real, this is Self. That art thotj, Svetaketu. He
said again: Teach me further, sir. Be it so, my Son,
he replied
Anegorrof “These rivers flow east and west, they are drawn
the sc*. frpm the sea east and west, and flow into the sea again.*
They become sea and only sea. They know not there
that one is this river and another that. And so with
all these living things. They come out of the real, and
do not know that they come out of it, and therefore they

1 The threefold nature of the 3 “ They are drawn up from the

elementa, as taught in the Cbh&n- sea into the clouds, fall again in
dogya, is B&id by the scholiasts to the form of rain, and in the shape
imply the fuller doctrine of quin- of the Ganges and other rivers
triplication, or the fivefold succes- flow back into the sea, and be-
■ive concretion of the elements come one with it again.”—dan*
already described in this chapter. karscfcaiy* in loco.
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 91

become in this life, as it may be, lion, or wolf, or boar, chat, iil
or worm; or moth, or gnat, or musquito. All this world
is animated by the supersensible. That is real, that is
Self. That art thou, Svetaketu. He said again:
Teach me further, sir. Be it so, my son, said Aruni.
“ Here is a great tree. If a man strike the root, it still Allegory of
lives, and its sap exudes. If he strike it in the trunk, it ita informing
still lives, and its sap exudes. If lie strike it at the top, it e"
still lives, and its sap exudes. This tree, permeated by
the living soul, stands still imbibing, still luxuriant,1
If the living soul forsake one of its branches, that
branch dries up: if it forsake a second branch, that
branch dries up: if it forsake a third branch, that
branch dries up: if it forsake the whole tree, the whole
tree dries up. Know this, my son, said Aruni. In¬
formed as "it is by the living soul, it is this body that
dies, the soul dies not. All this world is animated by
the supersensible. That is real, that is Self. That art
thou, Svetaketu. Hereupon Svetaketu spoke again:
Teach me further, holy sir. Be it so, my son, said Aruni.
“Take a fig from the holy fig-tree. Here it is, sir,
said he. Break it open. It i3 broken open, sir. What th«toiyfig-
dost thou see in it? These little seeds, sir. Break
open one of them. It is broken open, sir. What dost
thou see in it ? Nothing. His father said: From this,
so small that thou canst not see it, from this minute¬
ness the great holy fig-tree grows up. Believe, my son,
that all this world is animated by the supersensible.
That is real, that is Self. That art thou, Svetaketu.
He said again: Teach me further, sir. Be it so, my son,
said Aruni.
“ Take this lump of salt, and throw it into some Allegory of
* . jl . the wit in bait
water, and come to me again to-morrow. Svetaketu water,
did so. His father said: Take out the lump of salt
thou threwest into the water yesterday evening. He
1 The tree is the body, the body. These are vitalised by the
branches the constituents of the indwelling soul.
 92 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. £IL looked for xt, but could not find it, for it was dissolved.
His father told him to sip some water from the-surface.
What is it like ? It is salt, he answered. Taste it fur¬
ther down: what is it like ? It is salt. Taste it from
the bottom: what is it like? It is salt. Now thou
hast tasted it, come to me, said Aruni. $vetaketu
came and said: It remains always as it is. Hip father
said: The salt is still there, though thou seest it not.
All this world is animated by the supersensible. That
is real, that is Self. That art thou, Svetaketu, So
Svetaketu said again: Teach me further, sir. Be it so,
my son, he replied.
AHegray of'
the highway-
w A highwayman leaves a wayfarer from Kandahar
and the blindfold in a desolate waste he has brought him to.
blindfold tra¬
veller. The wayfarer brought blindfold into the waste and left
there; knows not what is east, what is north, and what
is south, and cries aloud for guidance. Some passer-by
unties his hands and unbinds his eyes, and tells him,
Yonder is the way to Kandahar, walk on in that direc¬
tion. The man proceeds, asking for village after village,
and is instructed and informed until he reaches Kan¬
dahar. Even in this way it is that in this life a man
that has a spiritual teacher knows the Sell He is*de-
layed only till such time as he pass away.1 All this
world is animated by the supersensible. That is real,
that is Sell That art thou, Svetaketu. Then &veta-
ketft said again: Teach me further, sir; Be it so, my
son, he replied.
Gradual de¬
parture of the
“ His relatives come round the dying man and ask,
■ool at death. Dost thou know me ? dost thou know me ? He recog¬
nises them so long as his voice passes not away into his
thought, his thought into his breath, bis breath into his
vital warmth, his warmth into the supreme divinity.
But when his Voice has passed away into thought, his

i* • 8¥® ^berated and yet him, to make his personality pass

,jwwimi&ii,kas to wait away for ever into the Unperson-
only tin his bqpy falls away from ality of the one and only Self.
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 93
thought into breath, his breath into warmth, his warmth chat. in,,
into the supreme divinity, then at last he ceases to
know them. All this world is animated by the super¬
sensible. That is real, that is Self. That art thou,
Svetaketu. After this Svetaketu spoke yet once again:
Teach me further, holy sir. Be it so, my son, said
Arum.
‘“They bring a man witn his hands tied before the Anegmy
Baja, saying, He has carried something off,- he haswSnT7
committed theft. Heat the axe for him. If the man
is guilty of the deed, but falsifies himself, intending
falsehood, and screens himself with a lie, he lays hold
of the red-hot hatchet and is burnt, and thereupon is
put to death. If he is guiltless he tells the truth
about himself, and with true intent, clothing himself
with the truth, he lays hold of the glowing hatchet
and is not burnt, and is not put to death. As he is not
burnt in that ordeal, so is the sage unhurt in the fiery
trial of metempsychosis. All this world is animated
by the supersensible. This is real, this is Self. That
art thou, Svetaketu.”
That art thou.1 The word that, in the first place, sciriutic ex¬
denotes the totality of things in the whole, that is, the Segrattext,
world-fiction, the Demiurgus or universal soul, and the Thlt &rttoua'
characterless Self. These three fictitiously present
themselves in union; the universal soul and the ficti¬
tious universe being penetrated and permeated by the
Self, as a red-hot lump of iron is penetrated and per¬
meated by fire.' The word that, in the second placei
points to the characterless Self apart from the fictitious
universal spirit, and the fictitious universe which over-
lies it.
The word thou, in the first place, denotes the totality
of things in the parts, that is, the various portions of the
world-fiction, the various individual minds or migrat¬
ing souls to which these portions are allotted, and the
1 This explanation is taken from NiisimhasaTasvatTs jSubodhinL
 94 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. hi. characterless Self. These three also fictitiously present

themselves in union; the various phases of the world-
fiction and the various migrating souls being penetrated
and permeated by the Self as a lump of iron by fire.
The word thou, in the second place, points to the
characterless Self, the pure bliss, that underlies the
various phases of the world-fiction and the various
migrating souls.
The sense of the text is therefore this: the individual
soul is one with the universal soul, and the universal
soul is one with, the one and only Self. It is of this
Self, throtigh the operancy of the world-fiction, that all
individual things and persons are the fictitious parts:—

With radiant light, as glowing iron with fire.

The differences that mark off thing from thing and

soul from soul are false, and shall pass away; the
spiritual unity that pervades and unifies them is true,
and shall abide for ever.
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 95

CHAPTER IV.

THE MUNDAKA UPANISHAD.

“ All are but parts of one stupendous whole,

Whose body nature is, and God the soul:
That changed through all, and yet in all the same.
Great in the earth as in the ethereal frame,
Warms in the sun, refreshes in the breeze,
Glows in the stars, and blossoms in the trees;
Lives through all life, extends through all extend
Spreads undivided, operates unspent;
Breathes in our soul, informs our mortal part,
As full, as perfect, in a hair as heart;
As full, as perfect, in vile man that mourns
As the rapt seraph that adores and bums:
To him no high, no low, no great, no small:
He fills, he bounds, connects and equals all.”—Pope.

“ And this deep power in which we exist, and whose beatitude is all
accessible to us, is not only self-sufficing and perfect in every hour, but
the act of seeing and the thing seen, the seer and the spectacle, the sub*
jefct and the object, are one. We see the world piece by piece, as the sun,
the moon, the animal, the tree; but the whole, of which these are the
shining parts, is the soul, From within or from behind a light shines
through us upon things, and makes us aware- that we are nothing, but
the light is all.”—Emerson.

Tt is said in a Vedic text that every Brahman1 comes Chat. iv.

into the world bringing with him three debts. • These are Th» nu^on
Ids debts to the Bishis ot sacred studentship, that lie th» at
may leam the primitive hymns by heart, and become
able himself to teach them to pupils of his own to ensure
their perpetual transmission; Ids debt of sacrifice to the
gods; and his debt to the Fitris or forefathers of the
1 J&yamano vai braltnianat trib- fiskibkyo, yajuena devdikyah, pm*.
hir rinaran jdyate, brahmackaryaia jayd fitfibh yah.
 96 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. XV.tribes, of ■ sous to offer the food and water to {heir

deceased father and to their progenitors. The pavmeut
of these debts is incumbent, on those living in the world;
and they must fulfil every'prescriptive usagd, and live
in obedience to the religion of tradition and liturgio
rites. Worship with its proper ritual is binding upon
the multitude, and has its fruit in raising the wor¬
shipper to higher embodiments, or procuring .for him
a sojourn in a paradise of the deities. This religion
belongs therefore to the world of fictions and semblances,
to the phantasmagoric world of migrating souls and
their spheres of recompense; and has its reality only
for the unpurified and unawakened spirit, for whom
it is true that the miseries of metempsychosis are real
enough. _ These immemorial rites and ordinances have
th*dr place; they are the religion of the n^any, and if
followed with the understanding of their mystic import,
and a knowledge of the deities invoked, may elevate
the worshipper to the paradise of Brahma. This under¬
standing and this knowledge are the “inferior science,”
apara iridya. The worship of the deities and the ances¬
tral usages, however, bear also a higher fruit. The
aspirant to extrication from metempsychosis may prac¬
tise them with a sole view to the purification of his intel-.
lect for the reception of higher truth. He turns his back
upon the world, and upon the religion of the world
and all its promises. He wishes for no higher form of
life, for every form of life is hateful; he wishes for no
paradise, for the pleasures of every paradise are tainted
Thsniigton and fugitive. The religion of usages and liturgic rites
SJaT is a mode of activity, and, like every other mode of
SSwSl101 action, tends to misery. Activity is the root of pain,
for so long as a living being acts so long must he receive
the award of his good and evil works, in body after
body, in aeon after, aeon. The aspirant has already
learnt, imperfectly as he may have realised it, that to
the true point of view taught by the recluses in the
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 97

jungle, the religion of rites and of immemorial usages, Chat, nr

the sacrifices, and the gods sacrificed to, are alike un- "
real: for the sage made perfect they have no existence.
There is no truth in things many, in things finite;
no truth where the thinker is other than the things
around him. A Vedic text says that he that medi¬
tates upon any; deity as a being other- than himself
has rno knowledge, and is a mere victim to the gods.
As soon as- a man. turns his back on every form of
life, and aspires to escape from all further embodi¬
ment, he is free from the debt' of sacrifice to the
deities, and the debt of progeny to the forefathers of
the! tribes. He may, if he will, leave these debts
unpaid, and proceed ^at once from sacred* studentship to
meditation and self-discipline in the jungle. After his
initiation irto ‘the Veda, the path of. abnegation and
knowledge is at once open to him. As there is no Thewiigionot.
truth in the many, all truth is in the one; and this
one that alone is is the Self, the inmost essence of all SSSier,nlgr*’
things, that vivifies all sentiencies and permeates all
things, from a tuft of* grass up to the highest god, up to
Bmhm& himself. This is the pure bliss, and it dwells
within the heart of every creature, and to see this and
to become one with it for ever is the highest end of
aspiration. It is to be reached only by a never-failing
inertion and a never-failing abstraction, by a rigid and
insensible posture, by apathy, vacuity, and ecstasy. To
see it, to become one with it, to melt away his per¬
sonality into its impersonality, a man must renounce
all ties, must repair to the solitude of the forest, must
crush ev6ry desire, and check every feeling and thought,
till his mind be fitted to reflect the pure light of undif¬
ferenced being, to be ifradiated with, till it pass away
into, “ the light of lights beyond the darkness.” In the
course of this procedure the cosmic fiction gradually
Vanishes, and the Self shines forth as the sun shines
cut slowly as the clouds disperse. There is thus a
 98 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. IV. higher religion for the few, to which the religion of the
many is only the first step of preliminary purifi tion.
This higher religion, the knowledge of the Self, is the
superior science, the para mdyd. The sacrifice?, and
the deities sacrificed to, and the recompenses, have a
relative reality to the unawakened multitude. They
have no reality to the already purified aspirant to
liberation from metempsychosis; he refuses Reality to
everything but the one and only real, and renounces all
things that he may find, that one and only real, the Self
within. His only business is with the spiritual intuition.
Such is the subsumption of harmavidya, the knowledge
of rites, under braJimavidya, the knowledge of the Self}
and such is the absorption of the religion of usages*
into the religion of ecstatic union. The inferior science
is a dharmajijndsd, or investigation of th several re¬
wards of the various prescriptive sacra; the superior
science is a trahmafijnasa, or investigation of the fontal
spiritual essence. Brahman.
This rellglo.i
or philosophy
The knowledge of the Self or Brahman is not a pri¬
must be learn¬ vate and personal thing, or attainable by an exercise of
ed from an
authorised the individual intellect. It is everywhere taught in the
exponent.
Upanishads that it was revealed by this or that god or
other semi-divine teacher, and handed down through a
succession of authorised exponents.1 It is only from
one of these accredited teachers that the knowledge of
the Self is to be had; as we have already read, “ A man
that has a spiritual teacher knows the Self.” All teach¬
ing that is out of accordance with the traditionary ex¬
position of the Upanishads, is individual assertion and
exercise of merely human ingenuity.2
These things premised, and with the information given
in the preceding chapters, the reader is in a position to
understand the Mundaka Upanishad. This is one Of
the Upanishads of the Atharvaveda, and one of the most
1
t /aparampard.
amdtra.
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 99

important documents of primitive Indian philosophy. Chap.iv.

Explanations will be given from time to time from the
traditional exposition of the scholiasts Sankaracharya
and Anandagiri. The text is as follows:—
I. i. “ Om. Brahma was the first of the gods that
emanated, the maker of the world, the upholder of the
spheres. He proclaimed the science of the Self, the
basis of all science, to his eldest son, Atharvan.
“ Atharvan in ancient days delivered to Angis that The
science of the Self which Brahma had proclaimed to him,
and Angis to Satyavaha the Bharadvaja, and the Bharad-
vaja transmitted the traditionary science to Angirasa.
“ Saunaka the householder came reverently to An¬
girasa and asked: Holy sage, what must be known that
all this universe may be known ?
“Angirasa replied: Those that know the Yeda say
that there are two sciences that are to be known, the
superior science and the inferior.
“ Of these, the inferior is the Eigveda, the Yajurveda,
the Samaveda, the Atharvaveda, and the instrumental
sciences, the phonetics, ritual, grammar, etymology,
metrics, and astronomy. The superior science is that
by which the imperishable principle is attained to.
“That which is invisible, impalpable, without kin- Toimowuia^
dred, without colour, that which has neither eyes nor aii thing*,
ears, neither hands nor feet, which is imperishable,
manifested in infinite variety, present everywhere, and
wholly supersensible,—that is the changeless principle
that the wise behold as the origin ef all things.
“The whole world issues out of that imperishableamfleotthe
principle, like as a spider spins his thread out of him¬
self and draws it back into himself again, or as plants
g”bw tip upon the earth, or as the hairs of thef head
and of the body issue out of the living man.”
Maya, the world-fiction, is, as has been already Been,
the body of Ifvara, the Archimagus, the first and highest
of emanations,—the body out of which all things pro-
 TOO THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap; IY. ceed, the kdranasctrlra. livara projects all things and
all migrating souls out of his body, and withdraws them
into it again at the close of each aeon, as the spider
extends its thread out of its body and draws, it back
into it again. The simile of the spider occurs also in
the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad. A curious misappre¬
Hume’e misin¬ hension on the part of Hume, or rather of some inform¬
terpretation of
this simile. ant of Hume, is noteworthy in reference to this image.
It is to be found in his Dialogues concerning Natural
Religion:—"The Brahmins asseTt that the world.arose
from an infinite spider, who spun this whole complicated
mass from his bowels, and annihilates afterwards the
whole or any paTt of it,hy absorbing it again and resolving
it 5nto his own essence. Here is a species of cosmogony
which appears to us ridiculous; because a spider is a
little contemptible animal, whose operations we are
never likely to take for a model of the whole universe.
But still here is a new species of analogy even in our
globe. And were there a planet wholly inhabited by
spiders, this inference would then appear as natural
and irrefragable as that which in one planet,ascribes
the origin of all things to design and intelligence.
Why an orderly system may not be spun irom the
belly as well as from the brain, it will be difficult to
give a satisfactory reason,” To return to the text-
The Demi* * Brahman begins to swell with fervid self-coercion.
uungns end
the world- Thence the aliment begins to unfold itself, and from that
ftcfeioto*
aliment proceed Pra^a,the internal sensory.the elements,
the actions of living souls, and their perennial fruits
“This Brahman,1 Hiraijyagarbha, and name and
colour, and food, issue forth out of that being that
knows all, that knows everything, whose self-coercion
is prevision”
Here again we meet with the same idea as in the
Nasadlyasukta and in the. Taittirlya Upanishad. The
* The tagunam, brahma, at hr turn of Brahman and Mays, the
ieftra brahma, the divine emana- rndt^padhilnm brahma.
 OF THE UPANISHAVS. IOJ

one, the Self, Brahman in association with Maya, chap, iv,

and bus already the creative I^vara,—that is to say, —
Brahman in the first quasi-personal manifestation or
emanation as the Demiurgus,—is said to engage in
self-torture,1 self-suppression, or self-coercion. This
self-torture of the Demiurgus is a meditation, a pre¬
vision of the world that is to be. The “aliment” is
the oosmieal illusion, developing itself in such a way
that each migrating soul shall pass through successive
lives appropriate to the residuary influences of its
works in the last seon. Prana or Hiranyagarbha, the
spint of dreaming sentiencies, emanates out of Bvara,
the all-knowing Demiurgus. “Fame and colour” is.
a constant phrase of the Upanishads for the outward
world in its visible and nameable aspects. Food as
the material of the earthly body, is the latest mani¬
festation of Brahman in the descending order of pro¬
gressive concretion.
The text speaks, in the next place, of the matter of
the two sciences. The inferior science, it says, has to
do with metempsychosis, and with the usages and rites
on the fulfilment or neglect of which higher and lower
future states of life depend ;• the superior science treats
of the knowledge of the Self as the means of releasing
the aspirant from further migration.
L 2. “ This is the truth: The rites which the sages lat'Mun***,
saw in the Mantras were widely current in the Tre- *184C <m‘
tayuga or second age of the world. Perform them
regularly, you that wish for’-rewards. This i^ your
path to recompense in a higher embodiment.
u When the fire is kindled, and its blaze is flickering,
the sacrificer should throw the offering between the
two portions of sacrificial butter, throwing it with
faith.
“ If the sacrifice upon the perpetual household fire

1 Tapcu, in this verse translated . and at the same time with its usual
in accordance with its derivation, sense, as fervid self-coercion.
 102 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. IT. be not followed by the oblation at new-moon, by tht

rhc rewards full-moon rites, by the Chaturmasya, and by th offer¬
»f the pre¬
scriptive rncra ing of first-fruits4 if it be unfrequented with guests; or
ire transient,
rhe sage must if it be unaccompanied with the oblation to all the
turn his back
upon them all deities; or if it be presented with any error in the
form; the sacrificer forfeits the seven ascending worlds
of recompense.
“ Eire has seven wavy tongues,—the black, the terrific,
the thought-swift, the red, the purple, the scintillating,
and the tongue of every shape, divine.
“ If a man offers his sacrifices while these tongues of
fire axe flashing, and offers them in proper season, his
very sacrifices become the solar rays to lead him up to
the abode of the one lord of all the gods.
“The shining sacrifices bear the sacrificer upward
through the solar rays, crying. Come hither, come
hither; greeting him with kindly voice, and doing
honour to him, saying. This is your recompense, the
sacred sphere of Brahma.
w But these sacrifices with their ritual and its eighteen
parts are frail boats indeed; and they that rejoice in
sacrifice as the best of things, in their infatuation shall
pass on again to decay and death.
“ They that are infatuated, dwelling in the midst of
the illusion, wise in their own eyes, and learned in their
own conceit, are stricken with repeated plagues, and go
round and round, like blind men led by the blind.
“ They are foolish, and living variously in this illu¬
sion, think that they have what they want: and since
they that trust in sacrifices are too greedy of higher
lives to learn the truth, they fall from paradise on the
expiry of their reward.
“ In their infatuation they think that the revealed
rites and works for the public good are the best and
highest thing, and fail to find the other thing that is
higher and better still. When they have had their
reward in the body in some upper mansion in paradise
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 103

they return to a human embodiment, or to a lower life Chap. iv.

thaa that of man.
“ They among them that practise austerity and faith
in the forest, quiescent, versed in the knowledge of the
gods, and living upon alms,—these put away the stain
of good and evil works, and go after death to the sphere
of She imperishable deity, the abiding spirit, Hiranya-
garbha;
u Surveying these spheres won by works, the seeker He must r*-
of Brahman should learn to renounce all things. No Suited
uncreated sphere of being is to be gained by works.
Therefoie he should take fuel in his hands, and repair
to a sacred teacher, learned in the Veda, intent upon
the Self, that he may leara the uncreate.
“ The spiritual guide, when he comes to him with
reverence, vrith a humble heart and with his senses re*
pressed, must truly expound to him the science of the
Self, as he knows the undecaying spirit, the sole reality.”
The aspirant to extrication from metempsychosis
must turn his back upon every sphere of recompense,
even upon the paradise of the gods that is won by
sacrificial rites, and upon the paradise of Hiranyagaxbha
or Brahma, that is attained to by those that add to their
outward worship a knowledge of the deities and of the
import of the rites. These latter reside in the paradise
of Brahma till the close of the aeon. All these spheres
of fruition are transitory; they reproduce each other
like seed and plant; they are empty and unsatisfying,
perishing like a reverie or dream, Idee the waters of a
mirage, like the bubbles and foam upon the surface of
a stream. To return to the text. The first section of
the second Mundaka treats of Brahman and the super
rior science.
II. i. “ This is the truth: As its kindred sparks fly ********
out in thousands from a blazing fire, so the varioussto&softh*
living souls proceed out of that imperishable principle, »iui»
and return into it again.
10+ THE PHILOSOPHY

“That infinite spirit is self-luminous, without and

within, without origin, without vital breath or thinking
faculty, stainless, .beyond the imperishable ultimate.”
The imperishable ultimate is the cosmical illusion.
Brahman is in truth untouched by the world-fiction.
It is only fictitiously that this overspreads Brahman,
as the waters of the mirage fictitiously overspread the
sands of the desert. All living things are only the'one
Self fictitiously limited to this or that fictitious mind
and body, and return into the Self as soon as the ficti¬
tious limitation disappears. As soon as the jar is
broken the ether from within it is one with the ether
without, one with ether one and undivided. The text
next speaks of the several unreal effluences or emana¬
tions from the Self as illusorily overspread with the
cosmical illusion. Each such emanation is 5alse; in the
words of the Chhandogya Upanishad, “ a modification
of speech only, a change, a name.”
“Erom that proceed the vital breath, the thinking
principle and all the organs of sense and motion, and
the elements, ether, air, fire, water, and the earth that
holds all things.”
Purusha or VaiSvanara, the universal soul that ema¬
nates from Hiragyagarbha, dwells in every living body,
and every living body is made up of the elements' just
spoken of. The text accordingly proceeds to charac¬
terise this Purusha.* The scholiast identifies him with
Vishnu.
“ Eire is his head, the sun and moon his eyes, the
regions his ears, the open Vedas are his voice, the air
is his vital breath, the whole world is his heart, the
earth springs from his feet, for this is the inner soul of
all living things.”
The whole world is said to be the heart of Purusha,
because it is all an effluence of the mind,1 into which it
is seen to melt away in the state of dreamless sleep,
1 istolhmiM, the »gsrec»,te of buddhi, manat, akanidva. and ckitta.
 OF THE

and out of which it re-issues when the sleeper awakes, cha?. nr.
as sparks fly up out of fire. The mind is in the heart.
Purusha is the soul internal to all living things, for in
ever} Uving< thing it is he that sees, hears, thinks, and
knows.
" Fire proceeds from him, and the sun is the fuel of
that fire. From the moon proceeds the cloud-god Par-
janya; ffom the cloud-god the plants upon the earth;
from these the germ of life. Thus the various living
things issue out of Purusha.
“ The Rik, the Saman, and the Yajush, the initiations,
the sacrifices, the offerings of victims, and the presents
® to the Brahmans, the liturgic year, the sacrificer, and
7 the spheres of recompense, those in which the moon
purifies, and those in which the sun purifies the elevated
O worshipper, —all these things issue out of Purusha.
^ “ The gods in various orders, the Sadhyas, men, and
Leasts, and birds, the hreath and vital functions, rice
■"Z and barley, self-torture, faith, truth, continence, and the
Ge prescriptive usages,—all issue out of Purusha.”
- The imagery of the ISTasadlvasukta was reproduced,
in the first section of the first Mundaka, that of the
Cko^(V
Purushasukta is reproduced in these verses. The cos-
^ mological conception of the poets of the Upanishads
seems to have had its first beginnings in .the later part
^^f the Mantra period of V edic literature.
► “ The seven breaths proceed from him, the seven
flames, the seven kinds of fuel, the seven oblations, the ^
seven passages of the vital airs, the vital airs that reside ^
0 in the cavity of the body, seven in each living thing.
dp “ It is from him that the seas and all the mountains
proceed; it is from him that the rivers flow in various
yA forms; it is from him that plants grow up, and their
qJ nutritious material by which the inner invisible body
is clothed with the visible ^elemental frame.
u All this world, with its sacrifices and its knowledge,
is Purusha: Self is supreme, immortal. My friend,
 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. IV.
he that knows this Sell that is seated in the heart of
The Tisicra of
every living thing, scatters off the ties of illusion ven
the Self within
the heart in
in this present life.”
the only Mira¬ The second section of the second Mundaka setp-forth
tion.
the means of a fuller knowledge of Brahman. The
aspirant is to meditate upon it as the characterless
essence that shines forth in every mode of mind, the
one and only Self illusorily manifested in the'plurality
of migrating souls.
ad Mundaka, II. 2. “ This Self is self-luminous, present, dwelling
ad Section.
in the heart of every living thing, the great centre of
all things. All that moves; and breathes, and stirs is
centred in it You know this' as that which is. and
that which is not; as the end of aspiration, above the
knowledge of all living things, the highest good:
“ As bright; as lesser than the least and. renter than
the greatest; as that on which all the spheres of recom¬
pense are founded, together with the tenahts of those
spheres. This same imperishable Brahman is the vital
air, the inner sensory, the voice. This same Brahman
is true, this is immortal. That is the mark. Hit it
•with thy mind, my friend.
Use of the " Let a man take the great weapon of the Upanishads
mystic
syllable Oil'
for his bow, and let him fix upon it his arrow sharpened
with devotion. Bend it with the thoughts fixed upon
the Self, and hit the mark, the undecaying principle.
“ The mystic utterance Om is the bow, the soul the
anoftr, the Self the mark. Let it be shot at with un¬
failing ■ heed, and let the soul, like an arrow, become
one with the mark.
“ It is over this Self that sky and earth and air are
woven, and the sensory, with all the organs of sense
and motion. Enow that this is the one and only Self.
Benounce all other words, for this is the bridge to
immortality.
“This Self dwells in the heart where the arteries
axe concentred, variously manifesting itself. OM: thus
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 107

medicate upon the Self, May it be well with you that chw. iv.
yo may’cross beyond the darkness. —
“ This Self knows all, it knows everything. Its glory
is in the world. It is seated in the ether in the irra¬
diated heart, present to the inner sensory, actuating
the organs and the organism, settled in the earthly
body. The wise fix their heart, and by knowledge see
the blissful, the immortal principle that manifests itself.
. '‘When a man has seen that Self unmanifest and The ti« of o»
manifest, the ties of his heart are loosed, all his per- «»-
plexities are solved, and all his works exhausted. theHghtoi’
“ The stainless, indivisible Self is in that last bright th*'worid-
sheath, the heart: it is the pure light of lights that
they that know the Self know.
“ The sun gives no light to that, nor the moon and
stars, neither do these lightnings light it up; how then
should this fire of ours ? All things shine after it as it
shines, all this world is radiant with its light
“It is this undying Self that is outspread before,
Self behind, Self to the right Self to the left, above,
below. AJ1 this glorious world is Self.”
The aspirant is bidden to renounce all other words.
He is to renounce the inferior science, the knowledge
of the gods and of the various rites with which they
are worshipped; for these things only prolong the aeries
of his embodied lives. The knowledge of Brahman is
said to be the bridge to immortality, as it is the Way
by which the sage is to cross over the sea of metemp¬
sychosis to reunite his soul with the Self beyond. The
Self or Brahman is said to reside in the heart, in the
midst of all the arteries. By this it is only meant that
the modifications of the mind seated within the heart
shine, or as we should say, rise into the light of con¬
sciousness, in the light of the Self. The'mind1 is in
the heart, and there receives the light of the one and
only Self, that itself is. everywhere, vbigue et in nullo
loco. It is only in semblance that the Self, which is
 108 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. it. everywhere, can be said to come and go to dwell lielfe

or there. The. indwelling of the Self is its manif ta-
tion in the mental inodes. A lotus-shaped • lump of
fle.sh in the heart is styled the hrahmapura, the abode
of Brahmam It is here that the Self is said to witness;
that is, to give light to, every feeling, thought, and pas¬
sion of the soul It is here that it sees unseen, hears
unheard, thinks unthought upon 5 but its vision,* its
hearing, and its thought are Hmintennittent and un¬
differenced. It does not see as we see; or hear as we
hear, or think as we think, but as a pure light of char¬
acterless intelligence. It gives light to all, and receives
light from nothing. It is the pure light beyond.the
darkness of the world-fiction; the pure bliss of exemp¬
tion from evil, pain, and weariness. All the things •
that present themselves in nameable and coloured
phases seem to be, and this ’only is.
The first section of the third Mundaka opens with
the simile of the two birds upon one tree. They repre¬
sent the migrating soul and l£vara the cosmic soul,
residing together in the body of each and every living
thing. This section is said to treat of the qualifications.
required in an aspirant to liberation, before he can
enter on the pursuit of ecstasy and intuition of the
Self.
I*" ^ wo always together and united nestle
same tree > 0116 ^em eats the sweet fruit of
.«& on* tree, the holy fig-tree, the other looks on without eating.
“ In the same tree the migrating soul is immersed,
and sorrows in its helpless plight, and knows not what
to do; but its sorrow passes as soon as it sees the adored
ioid, and that this world is puly his glory.
“ When the sage sees the golden-hued maker of the
world, the lord, the Purusha that emanates from Brah¬
man, he shakes off his good and evil works, and without
stain arrives at the ultimate identity”
The body is a tree that bears the fruits of actions
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 109

in a former life. The migrating soul, clotheu in the chap, it.*

ten ous involucrum, resides in the body, and eats the —
various fruits of its good and evil actions in earlier
embodiments. Not so the Demiurgus, the golden-hued,
that is, the self-luminous, universal soul, ever pure,
intelligent, and free. He actuates all the migrating
souls and all the spheres through which they migrate,
butr takes no part in the experiences they pass through.
The soul, laden with illusions, and with cravings after
temporal felicity, is fated to pass through all the varied
anguish of hunger, thirst faintness, sickness, partings,
bereavements, decay, and death, in body after body in
vegetal, animal, or human shape, through countless
ages; till at last the good works that it has done in a
series of,lives may bring it in a human embodiment
into the presence of a spiritual guide, who shall teach
it the way of release from further migration, through
self-torture, ecstasy, and intuition in which it identifies
itself, first with the universal soul, and then with the one
and only Self.
- "This ISvara is the living breath that variously
manifests itself in all living things. Knowing him, the
sage ceases to speak of many things; his sport is in
the Self, Iris joy is in the Self, his action is relative to
the Self, and he i3 the best of those that know the
Sell
“ For this Self is to be reached by persevering truth- Mental
fulness, self-coercion, precise intuition, and continence. aTwrtemt
This Self, which ascetics behold after the annulment 0f toUb*rltio“-
their imperfections, is within the body, luminous and
pure.
“ It is truth that prevails, not falsehood. The road
is laid out by truth, the divine path by which the
Rishis free from all desire proceed to the treasure of
truth.
“ That Self is great and luminous, unthinkable; it is
supersensible beyond the supersensible, farther than the
 no TUB PHILOSOPHY

Chip. IV. farthest,- atid 'yet near, within the’body, seated within
the cavity of the heart of those that see it.
“ It is not apprehended by the eye, nor by the voice,
nor by the other organs of sense and motion, nor by
self-coercion, nor by sacrificial rites. He whose mind is
purified by the limpid dearness of his knowledge, sees
.in meditation that undivided Self.
“ This supersensible Self is to be known by £he mind,
in the body in which the vital air has entered to its
fivefold functions; every mind of living things is over¬
spread with the vital airs, and when this mind is purified
the Self shines forth.
“ He whose mind is purified wins whatever sphere of
•recompense he aspires to, and whatever pleasures he
desires. Therefore let him that wishes for -prosperity
worship him that knows the Self.”
A pure mind Truthfulness, the repression of the senses and the
i« the only
mirror that volitions, and continence, are part of the purification of
reflect* the
Belt the mind required in the seeker of spiritual insight and
ecstatic union. They are among the qualifications of
the aspirant. In its natural state the'mind is stained
with desires, aversions, and passions relative to external
things, and like a tarnished mirror or a ruffled pool, is
unprepared to mirror the Self that is ever present to it.
The senses must he checked and the volitions crushed,
that the impurity and turbid discoloration of tbe mind
may be purged away, and that it may become an even
and. lucid reflecting surface, to present the image of the
Sell This image of the Self1 is itself a mode of -mind,
but ifris the last of the modes of the mind, arising only
when the mind is ready to melt away into the fontal
unity of the characterless Self. As this mode passes
away, the personality of the sage passes away with it
into the impersonality of Brahman. The magical
powers of the Yogin or ecstatic seer are again asserted..
AJ1 that is promised to the follower of the prescriptive
1 PhaUtam, brahma.
 OF THE VPANISHADS. til

sacra, of the religion of the many, is promised to him, if Char iv.

he d sire it, before his re-absorption into the spiritual
essence. The promise is intended as a farther incite-
ment to the seeker of release from the miseries of
metempsychosis.1 Here again, as elsewhere, the Mun-
<Jaka TJpanishad i3 remarkable for the clearness with
which it states the relation of the philosophy of the
recluses of the forest to the religion of those living in
the world. This religion is retained as part of the ficti¬
tious order of things; real for the many, as bearing fruit,
in the unreal series of embodied lives, and unreal for
the few that turn their back upon the world, and refuse
reality to all things but the spiritual unity that per¬
meates them. The old religion, unreal as it is, is needed
for the purification of the unreal mind, and has its
place prior to the quest of the sole reality. It has its
place and'passes away: for the perfected sage it is a
figment.
The last section of the Mundaka TJpanishad is as
follows:—
III. 2. “ He knows the supreme Brahman, the base
on which the world is fixed, which shines forth in its
pprity. The wise that have put away desire and wor¬
ship this sage, pass beyond all further re?embodiment.
“ He that lusts after pleasures and gives his mind to
them, is bom by reason of them into sphere after sphere
of recompense; but if a man has already all that he
desires and has found the Self, all his cravings melt
away even in his present embodiment
" This Self is not attainable by learning, by memory,
by much sacred study, but if he choose this Self it is the perfect ■
attainable by him: the Self itself manifests its own,**8*’
essence to him.
“ This Self is not attainable by a man that lacks for¬
titude, nor without concentration, nor by knowledge
1 SaguxavidyapXalam apt nirptuiavidySttutaye prarochan&rQum ucA-
yate. Anandagiri.
 m THE PHILOSOPHY

naiv xv. without the renunciation of the world; but if a sage

exert himself with these appliances, his soul ente a the
abode of Brahman.
“ When they that have this inner vision, satisfied
with knowledge, perfected in the spirit, their imperfec¬
tions passed away, their faculties quiescent,—when they
hare reached this Self, when they have fully reached
the all-pervading principle,—-with perfect insight and
with spirits unified, they enter into the all of things.
“ All these quietists, familiar with the object of in¬
tuition in the Upanishads, pu^fied in mind by renun¬
ciation and ecstatic union, are liberated in the hqur of
death, being one with the supreme immortal principle.
“The fifteen constituents of their bodies re-enter
their several elements; their senses return into their
several presiding deities; their works and tfygir conscious
soul are all unified in the imperishable Self.
He loses him- “ The sage, quitting name and colour, inters .into the
self-luminous spirit beyond the last principle,1 in like
•eUinOuua. manner ^ rjvers flow- on until they qiiit their name
and colour, and lose themselves in the sea.
“He that knows that highest Self becomes that
highest Self only. There is none in his family ignorant
of the Self. He passes beyond misery, he passes beyond
the taint of good and evil works, he is released from his
heart's ties, and becomes immortal.
“Therefore it has been said in a memorial verse:
Let a sage reveal this knowledge of Brahman to those
only that have fulfilled the prescriptive rites, who know
the Yeda, intent on the Self, who sacrifice to that one
Bishi, the fire-god Agni, and have duly achieved the
self-torture of carrying fire upon their heads.
“ This true Self was proclaimed of old by Angiras the
Bishi .Let none that has not undergone that discipline
presume to study it Glory to the great Bishis. Glory
to the great Bishis.”
1 The wwld-fietioiL*
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 113

They, says 3ankaracharya, that rise to the ecstatic chaf.iv.

vision become one in the unity of the one and only
Self. The images of the sun are seen no longer when
the watery surfaces evaporate. The jar is broken, and
the.ether that was in it is again one with the ether
gne and undivided. On the rise of the ecstatic vision
nil the difficulties of the sage are past; to raise fresh
impediments is beyond the power of the gods them¬
selves. He has passed through the darkness into light.
His personality passes into impersonality, his mortality
into immortality. He has found himself, and is for
evexr one with the one and .all.
Fichte,1 in like but higher terms, rich with the nchto quoted,
thought of centuries, speaks of his recognition of his^^SSl#
nature as one of the many manifestations of the one
abiding spiritual essence, the life of which is the pro-
gressive .life of all things. . * I have indeed dwelt in
darknes& during the past days of my life. I have
indeed heaped error upon error, and imagined myself
wise. Now for the first time do I wholly understand
the doctrine which from thy lips, 0 wonderful spirit,
seemed so strange to me, although my understanding
had* nothing to oppose to it; for now for the first time
do I comprehend it in its whole compass, in its deepest
foundation, and through all its consequences. Man is
not'd, product of the world of sense, and the end of his
existence cannot be attained in it His vocation tran¬
scends time and space, and everything that pertains to
sense. What he is and to what he is to train himself,
that must he know: as his vocation is a lofty one,-he
must he able to lift his thoughts above all the limitations
of sense. He must accomplish it: where his bein£ finds
its home, there his thoughts too seek their dwelling-
place; and the truly human mode of thought, that
which alone is worthy of him, that in which his whole
spiritual strength is manifested, is that whereby he
1 Dr. W. Smith** Popular Works of Fichte, pp. 368, wjq.
H
 114 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap: iv. raises himself above those limitations, whereby all that
pertains to sense vanishes into nothiug,—into a mere
reflection, in' mortal eyes, of the one self-existent
infinite. Thou art best known to the childlike, de¬
voted, simple mini To it thou art the searcher of
the heart, who seest its inmost depths; the .ever¬
present true witness of its thoughts, who knowest its-
truth, who knowest it although all the world know it
not The inquisitive understanding which has heard
of thee, but seen thee not, would teach us thy nature;
and as thy image shows us a monstrous and incon¬
gruous shape, which the sagacious laugh at, and the
wise and good abhor. I hide my face before thee, and
lay iny hand upon my lips. How thou art and seemest
to thy own being, I shall rever know, any more than’
I can assume thy nature. After thousands of spirit-'
lives, I shall comprehend thee as little as I do now in
this earthly house. That which I conceive becomes
finite through my very conception of it; and this can
never, even by endless exaltations, rise into the infinite.
In the idea of person there are imperfections, limita¬
tions: how can I clothe thee with it without these?
How that my heart is closed against all earthly things,
now that. I have no longer any sense for the transitory
and perishable, the universe appears before my eyes
clothed in a more glorious form. The dead, heavy
mass which only filled up space is vanished; and in its
place there flows onward, with the rushing music of
mighty waves, an eternal stream of life, and power,
and action, which issues from the original source of all'
life,—from thy life, 0 infinite one, for all life is thy
life, and only the religious eye penetrates to the realm
of true beauty. The ties by which my mind was
formerly united to this world, and by whose secret
guidance I followed all its movements, are for ever
sundered; and I stand free, calm, and immovable, a
universe to myself. Ho longer through my affections,
 OF- THE: WANISBADS. ' tf|

buH>y my eye alone, do I apprehend outward', objects omr-iv.

and am connected with them; and this eye itself is
purified by freedom, and looks through error and defor¬
mity to the true and beautiful, as upon the -unruffled
Surface of water shapes are more purely mirrored in a
milder li«ht. My mind is for ever closed- against em-
barrassinent and perplexity, against uncertainty, doul?t,
and anxiety: my.heart against:grief, repentance,and
desire”
 116 THE PHILOSOPHY

CHAPTER V.

THE KATHA UPANTSHAD.

* If the Ted slayer think he slays,

Or the slain think he is slain,
They little know the subtle ways
I keep, and pass, and turn again.
Far or forgot to me is near,
Shadow and sunlight are the same;
The vanished gods to me appear,
And one to me are shame and fame.
They reckon ill who leave me ont,
Me when they fly I am the wings;
I am the doubter and the doubt, .
And I the hymn the Brahman sings.
The strong gods pine for my abode,
And pine in vain the Sacred seven;
But thou, meek lover of the good.
Find me, and turn thy bade on heaven.”
—EiraBsoKi

•Ciu*. y. The reader is by this time becoming familiar with the

general conception of the primitive Indian philoso¬
phers, and with the grotesque imagery and rude subli¬
mity with which it is exhibited in. the Upanishada,
Epithet is added to epithet, and metaphor to metaphor,
and sentence stands by sentence in juxtaposition, rather
than in methodical progression, till we are at a loss to
pass any judgment, and feel alternately attracted and
xepelled. The thoughts of these thinkers formed them¬
selves out of other antecedents, and other predisposi¬
tions, and in another medium, than any of# which we
have had experience. In the present chapter the work
of exposition will proceed by the presentation of the
Katha Upanishad, a perspicuous and poetical TJpani-
 OF THE UPAN1SHADS. ti7

shad of the Yajurveda. This Upanishad opens with Chap. v.

the legend of the revelation of the Irahmavidya,, or —*
knowledge of the one and only Self by Yama, the regent
of thS dead, to Nachiketas the son of Yaja^ravasa.
I. “ Vajairavasa, with the desire of recompense, K4h» up»nt.
offered sacrifice, and gave all that he possessed to the Ete»tv»m.
priests. He had a son named Nachiketas.
" While the presents were in course of distribution
to the priests and to the assembly, faith entered into
Nachiketas, who was yet a striplibg, and he began to
think:
"'These cows have drunk all the water they will
ever drink, they have grazed as much as they will
graze, they have given all the milk that they will ever
give, and they will calve no more. They are joyless
spheres of Recompense .that a sacrificer goes to, who gives
such gifts as these.
" He therefore said to his father: Father, to whom wilt
thou give me ? He said it a second time a'nd a third
time, until his father exclaimed: I give thee to Death.
“Nachiketas thought: I pass for the first among
many disciples, I pass also for the middlemost among
many: what has Yama to do that he will do with me
to>day ? ”
Seeing his father’s regretful looks, and fearing that
he would break his promise- to the regent of the dead,
Nachiketas begs him not to waver.
“ Look’ back and see how those of old acted, and how
those of later days. Man ripens and is reaped like the
corn in the field, and like the com is bom- agaih.”
His father sends him to the realm of Yama. The
death-god is absent, and Nachiketas is neglected. On
Yama’s return his wife and servants admonish him:
1 “ When a Brahman comes into the house he is like
a fire, and therefore men offer him the customary pro¬
pitiation. Bring water for his feet,. Vaivasvata.1
1 A patronymic of Yama tbe son of Yiyasrat
 n8 THE PHILOSOPHY

Caw.v. WA Brahman that stays without eating food in the

' house of an inattentive host lays waste all his hopes
and expectations, the merits that he has earned by
intercourse with good men, by friendly speech, and by
sacrifices and works for the public good,1 as well as all
his children and his flocks and herds.
Tumbjdi "Hearing this, Yama said to Nachiketas: Three
nights hast thou lodged in my house fasting, then a
Brahman guest that shouldst be worshipped. Hail,
Brahman, and may it be well with me. Choose there¬
fore three wishes, a wish for each such night.
L*gjf* “ Nachiketas said: God of death, I choose as the first
wtantohi» of these three wishes that my father Gautama may he
easy in his mind, that he may he gracious towards me,
that his anger may .be turned away from me, that thou
send me hack to him, and that, he may know me again
and speak to me.
“ Yama replied: Auddaliki,* the son-of Aruiia, by my
permission shall he as tender towards thee as of old.
He shall sleep peacefully at night, and his anger shall
pass away when he sees thee-released from the power
of Death.
* Hachiketas said: In the sphere of paradise there is -
no fear. Thou art not there, and there man fears not
decay. A man passes beyond both hunger and thirst,
leaves misery behind, and rejoices in the sphere- of
paradise.
“ Thou, Death, knowest the sacred fire that is the means
of winning a sojourn in paradise. Teach me about it, for
I have faith. They that are insphered;in paradise part
take of immortality. I choose this as the second wish.
rtMMoond “ Yama said: I know the fife that leads to paradise,
Sj^orthT and tell it<to thee: therefore listen. Know that that
St1*4* fire that wins the endless sphere for him that knows
it, the basis of the world, is seated in the heart.”
'1 Saich u tanks, wells,- roads, bridges, gardens.
* A name of VBja.'irayasa.
 OF THE UPANISHABS. 119

The fire the knowledge of which is recompensed by chap. v.

a sojourn in Svarga, the paradise of the gods, is a figura-
tive name for VaiSvanara, Purusha, or Viraj, the divine
soul that dwells in all that live in earthly bodies.
Yama proceeds to teach Nachiketas the nature of that
divine VaiivaUara. The sage is to meditate upon him¬
self as one with that-. mystic fire; the seven hundred
and twenty bricks that form the sacrificial hearth are
the days and nights of the year, and so on. He •'’’ill
then become one with VaiSvanara.
“He revealed to him that fire, the origin of these
spheres of migration, and what were the bricks, , and
how many, and how laid out, in building the sacrificial
hearth; and Nachiketas repeated everything after him
as he had said it. So Death was pleased, and spoke again.
“Feeling-'gratified, the large-minded Yama said, I
give thee now and here another gift: this fire shall
be called by thy name. Take also this necklace of
gems of various colours.
“He that thrice performs the NSchiketa fiery rite,
taking counsel of three,—of his father, his mother, and
his spiritual teacher,—and fulfilling the three observ¬
ances of sacrifice, sacred study, and almsgiving, passes
beyond birth and death. He that knows and gazes
upon the lustrous and adorable emanation of Hiranya-
garbha, the divine being that proceeds from Brahma
(or ISvara), passes into peaoe for ever.
“ He that has performed three Nachiketa "rites, and
knows these three things,---the bricks, their number,
and the arrangement of them,—he that thus piles up
the Nachiketa fire, shakes off the ties of death before
he dies, leaves his miseries behind, and rejoices in the
sphere'of paradise.
“ This is thy fire, Nachiketas, the knowledge of which'
wins paradise. This thou hast chosen as thy second
boon, and men shall call this fire thine. Choose the
third wish, Nachiketas.”
 120 THB PHILOSOPHY

Cba%t. Identification •with Purusha or Yailvanara, with its

consequent exemption from personal’ experiences in
body after body till the close of the seon, is the pro¬
mise to those that meditate on the allegory, of the
Naehiketa fire. In this there is no final release from
metempsychosis, as the soul of the rewarded votary
will have to enter afresh on its transit from body to
body and sphere .to sphere at the opening of the
next seon. The third gift requested by Nachiketas is
teaching relative to the renunciation of all things and
the quest of the real and immortalising knowledge of
sfagate&w Brahman. The form in which the request is preferred
points, to the existence of doubt and dissentiency on
spiritual questions in the age of the TTpanishads. A
similar indication occurs in the second verse of the
&veta£vatara Upanishad: “Is time to be-thought the
source of things, or the nature of the things them¬
selves, or the retributive fatality, or chance, or the
elements, or the personal soul?” Another occurs in
the sixth Prapathaka of the .Chhandogva Upanishad;
with a reference to Buddhistic or pre-Buddhistic teach¬
ing of the emanation of migrating souls and the
spheres through which they migrate from an aboriginal
void or Wank : “ Existent only, my son, was this in the
beginning, one only, without duality; but some have
said: Non-existent only was this in the beginning,
one only, without duality, and the existent sprang out
of the non-existent; but how could it be so, how could
entity come out of nonentity ?” To return to the
Ka$ha Upanishad.
The feud gift, « Nachiketas said: "When a man is dead there is t.hia
ft knowledge
Sdlrftoieai ^0XL^ him: some say that he is, and others say
*•*«*•. that he is no more. Let me learn how this is from
thy teaching, and let this be the third booT?.”
Some people say there is, and some say there is not,
a Self1 other than the body, the senses, and the mind,
1 tfarirendrigamancbud^ dch&ntaratambandhy dtmd, San-
kftrftch&rya.
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 121

that passes onward into another body. This is a matter chap. v.

that is beyond human observation and human reason-
ing, and yet we must know it if we would know the
highest end of man.
“ Yama said: The gods themselves have been puzzled
about this long ago, for it is no easy thing to find out.
This is a subtile nature. Choose another boon, Nachi-
ketas, preSs me not; but release me from this gift.
“Nachiketas answered: As for thy saying, Death,
that the very gods have been perplexed'about this long
ago, and that this is no easy thing to learn,—there is
no other teacher to be found like thee, no other boon
that shall be equal to this.
“ Yama said: Choose sons and grandsons gifted with
a hundred years of life, many flocks and herds, ele¬
phants, and gold, and horses: choose a wide expanse
of soil, and live thyself as many autumns as thou wilt.
“ If thou thinkest of any other gift as great, choose
that Choose riches and long life, and rule over a wide
territory, and I will give thee the enjoyment of thy
desires.
“ Ask what thou wilt, ask for whatever pleasures are
hardest to get in the world of men. Ask for these
nymphs, their heavenly chariots and heavenly music,
for such as these are not to be won 'by men; have
thyself waited upon by these, for I will give them;
but ask me not about dying.
“ Nacliiketas answered: These are things that may
or may not be to-morrow, and things that waste the
strength of all the faculties; and every life alike is
short. I leave to thee the chariots, and the singing
and the dancing.
"A man i3 not to be satisfied with wealth. We
shall obtain wealth. If we have seen thee we shall
live so long as tbon rulest, but no more. The boon
that I choose is preferable to this.
“For what decaying mortal in this lower world,, after
 122 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. v. coming into the presence of the undecaying and im-

mortal gods,—what mortal that has knowledge, and
that reflects upon the fleeting pleasures of beauty and
love, would be enamoured of long life ?
“ Tell us, Death, about that great life after death
that the gods are themselves in doubt about. Nachi-
ketas chooses no other boon than this boon that pene¬
trates that mystery.”
So far Yama has tested the readiness of Nachiketas
to renounce the pleasures of the world. Finding him.
ready to put away all ties, he judges that he is a fit
disciple, and proceeds to contrast the two pursuits of
men, the pursuit of the pleasurable, which prolongs
the series of embodied lives, and the pursuit of the
good, which leads to a final release from metempsy¬
chosis. Nachiketas has already chosen the pursuit of
the good.
Second VaUL IL " The good is oue thing; the pleasurable another.
Sie Both these engage a man, though the ends are diverse.
goo<t Of these, it is well with him that takes the good, and
he that chooses the pleasurable fails of his purpose.
“ Both the good and the pleasurable present them¬
selves to man; and the wise man goes round about them
both and distinguishes between them. The sage pre¬
fers the good to the pleasurable; the unwise man chooses
the pleasurable that he may get and keep.
* Thou, Nachiketas, hast thought upon these tender
and alluring pleasures, and hast renounced them.
Thou hast not chosen the path of riches, which most
men sink in.
tf Far apart are these .diverse and diverging paths,
the path of illusion and the path of knowledge. I
know thee, Hachiketas, that thou art a seeker of know¬
ledge, for all these various pleasures that I proposed
have not distracted thee.
TheHtargi* 1 “They that are infatuated, dwelling in the midst
TiMod fenders 1 This verse oecora also in the second, seutluii of the first Mundaka-
ofthsUiad. See above, p. iox.
 OF THE VPANJSHADS. 133

of tbe illusion,, ■wise in their own eyes, and learned in Ghat. v.

their own conceit, are stricken with repeated plagues, 1
and go round and round, like blind men led by the
blind.
“ Preparation for the hereafter does not suggest itself
to the foolish youth neglecting everything in his infa¬
tuation about riches. Thinking that this life is, and
that there is no life after this, he comes again and again
into subjection to me.
“The good, the Self, is not reached by mauy thatseetemoi
they should hear it; and many healing of it know it
not Wonderful is he that teaches it, and wise is he
that attains to it; wonderful is he that knows it when
he is taught by the wise.
"This Self is not proclaimed by an inferior man;
it is not 4asy to know when variously thought upon.
When it is taught by one that is one with it, there is
no. dissehtiency about it. It is supersensible beyond
the infinitesimal, and is unthinkable.
"This idea of the Self that thou hast gained is not
to he attained by the discursive intellect, but it is easy
to know it when revealed by another, dearest disciple.
Tlion art truly steadfast. May I find another questioner
equal to thee, Nachiketas!
" I know that the treasure of recompense is fleeting,
for that lasting Self is not gained by transient works;
and therefore I have piled up the Nachiketa fire, and
have won with perishable goods a lasting sphere.”
There is an apparent inconsistency between the former
and the latter portions of this last verse. The scholiast
explains that the lasting sphere that Yama has attained
by means of the Nachiketa sacrifice is the regency of
the dead. This is said to be lasting, not as everlasting
like the Self, but only as enduring throughout an aeon
until the next dissolution or collapse of all things into
the aboriginal unity of Brahman. In the verse that
next follows Yama commends Nachiketas for refusing
 134 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap.V. to be satisfied with the sphere of the highest" divinity

already promised to his knowledge of the Nachiketa
rite, and for insisting on the pursuit of a knowledge of
Brahman, the one and only Self.
JtenuBcwtion “ Though thon hast seen the consummation of desire
and medita¬
tive abstrac¬ the basis of the world, the lasting meed of sacrifice, the
tion the only
path of safety. farther shore where fear- is left behind,—great and

glorious and wide-spread, a place to stand Upon, -yet,

Nachiketas, thou hast renounced it all, wise in thy
fortitude.
“By spiritual abstraction the sage recognises the
primeval divine Self, invisible, unfathomable; put out
of sight by things of sense, but seated in the heart,
dwelling in the recesses of the mind; and on recognis¬
ing it he bids farewell to joy and sorrow.
“ When a mortal man has heard this, and grasped it
on all sides, and parted Self from all that is not Self,
and reached this subtile essence, he rejoices at it, for he
has won pure bliss. I know thee; Nachiketas, to be a
habitation open to that spiritual essence.
*'Nachiketas said: Tell me about that which thou
seest, which is apart from good and apart from evil,
apart from the create and the uncreate, apart from that
which has been and that which is to be.
the my*tic “Tama said: I will tell thee briefly the utterance
TiyllaWe i)x
moat be 9m* that all the Yedas celebrate, which all modes of self1
ployed by the
■c'-kar of tbe coercion proclaim, and aspiring to which men live as
BpU.
celibate votaries of sacred science. It is Oic.
“ This mystic utterance is Brahma, this mystic utter¬
ance is Brahman. He that has this has all that he
would have.
“ This is the best reliance, this is the highest reliance;
he that knows this reliance is glorified in the sphere of
Brahma.9’
The repetition of the mystic monosyllable and medi¬
tation upon it, is said to raise the less-skilful aspirants1
1 ITw tnandddhildrin and madkyamddkiJxLria.
 OF THE VPANISEADS. 125

to th$ paradise of Brahma, the highest of the deities, chasu v.

the first emanation out of the divine Self. To the
higher order of aspirants1 it serves as a help on the
way to knowledge of Brahman, and extrication from
the miseries of metempsychosis, as being an image or a
substitute for the characterless Self.
<cThis Self is not born, and dies not; it is omniscient.
It proceeds'from none, and none proceeds from it; it is
without beginning and without end, unfailing, from
before all time. It is not killed when the body is
killed.
* If the slayer think to slay, and if the slain think
that he is slain, they neither of them know the Self
that they are. This neither slays nor is slain.
“ Lesser than the least and greater than the greatest, Antithetic
this Self is Stated in the heart of every living thing.
This the passionless sage beholds and his sorrows are
le|£ behind; in the limpid clearness of his faculties he
sees the greatness of the Self.
"Motionless it moves afar, sleeping it goes out on
every side. Who but I can know that joyful and
joyless deity ?
“ It is bodiless and in all bodies, unchanging and in
all changing things. The sage that knows himself to
be the infinite, all-pervading Self, no longer sorrows.”
The scholiasts remark that contradictory attributes
are simultaneously predicable of the Self, as, on the
one hand, it is the characterless Self per se, and as, on
the other hand, it is- the Self present in this or. that
fictitious embodiment The Self may thus be likened
to a colourless gem reflecting the various hues of the
things that are nearest to it, or to a magic crystal,2
presenting to the spectator the various things he may
choose to think about The pure indifference alone is
true, the differences are illusory, mere figments of the
cosmical illusion.
1 UttamddhiJcariiL 3 Chint&mani.
 126 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. V. i« This Self is not attainable by- learning, by me aory,

The Self mani¬
, by much saered study; but if he chooses this Self it
fests itself to is attainable by him: the Self itself manifests its own
the purified
aspirant essence to him.
“ Neither he that has not Ceased from evil, nor-he that
ceases not from sensations, nor he that is not concen¬
trated, nor he whose mind is not quiescent, can reach
this Self by spiritual insight.
“Who in this way blows where that Self is, of
which Brahman and Kshatriya are the food and death
the condiment ? ”
All personal distinctions are merged in the cha¬
racterless impersonality of the Self. Brahman2 ancf
Kshatriya, and death itself that swallows all, are
swallowed up and reabsorbed into it, at the close of
every aeon. To return to the text
Third VallL III. “ The universal and the individual souls residing
The individual
soul and the in the cavity, in the ether of the heart, in the sa e
soul of the
world. body, drink in the recompense of works. Sages that
know the Self, householders that keep up the five
sacred fires,2 and worshippers who have thrice per¬
formed the Nachiketa rite,—alike pronounce that these
universal and the individual souls are like shade and
sunshine.”
Properly speaking, it is only the individual soul that
has fruition of its works in body after body. The
visible body is the place of pleasures and pains.1 The
universal soul, or livara, abides together with it in the
heart, the regulator of its actions and witness of it?
experiences, as is set forth in the simile of the two
birds in the first section of the third Mundaka. The
individual soul differs from the universal as shade from
1 Tills wse occurs also in the each pralaya or period of uni
second section of the third Man- venal oftlfapsA,
daka. See above, p. na * Hie five fires known as^nvfi-
3 Braksuui* manifested as 14- h&y&pach&na, Gfirhagatya, Aha*
vara, is here spoken of as the vid- vainya* S&bhya, and Avasathya.
vasajphartri, as retracting all 4 SuJchaduWidgcdana, bhoga-
things into its own essence at syatana*
 OF THE UPANISHADS. is7

sunshine, the individual soul migrating from body to chap. v.

body, and the universal soul being free from such
migration.
"We know and can pile up the Naehiketa fire, the
bridge that leads the sacrificers to the sphere of the
highest deity; and we also know the undecaying,
highest Self, the farther shore beyond all fear for those
that will tor cross the sea of metempsychosis.’5
There now follows the celebrated simile of the' cha¬
riot.1 The migrating soul is compared to a person in
8 chariot; the body is the chariot, the mind is the
charioteer, the common sensory or will the reins, the
senses the horses. The soul drives in this chariot
either along the path of metempsychosis, or along the
road of liberation from further embodiments.
“ Know that the soul is seated in a chariot, and that Aii^ory of
the body is that chariot. Know that the mind is thetie 011“‘0t
charioteer, and that the will is the reins.
a They say that the senses are the horses, and that
the things of sense are the road. The wise declare
that the migrating soul is the Self fictitiously present
in the body, senses, and common sensory.
“ Now if the charioteer, the mind, is unskilful, and
the reins are always slack, his senses are ever unruly,
like horses that will not obey the charioteer.
“But if the charioteer is skilful, and at all times
firmly holds the reins, his senses are always manageable,
like horses that- obey the charioteer.
“ If the mind, the charioteer, lacks knowledge, and
does not firmly hold the will, and is always defi¬
cient in purity, the soul fails to reach the goal, and
returns to further transmigration.
“But if the charioteer has knowledge, and firmlyThegoaiisw.
holds the will, and is at all times pure, the soul then
arrives at the goal, and on reaching it is never bom again, ^on SuiT
“The soul whose charioteer is skilful and holdstheSelt
1 Ratharutpalca.
 123 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chaf. V. firmly the reins of the will, reaches the further term of
its migration, the sphere of Vishnu the Supreme.
" For their objects are beyond and more subtile than
the senses, the common sensory is beyond'* the, objects,
the mind is beyond the sensory, and the great soul
Hira^yagarbha is beyond the mind.
“ The ultimate, and undeveloped principle1 is beyond
that great soul, and Purusha,2 the Self, is beyond th$
undeveloped principle. Beyond Purusha there .if
nothing; that is the goal, that is the final term.
“ This Self is hidden in all living things, it shines
not forth; but it is seen by the keen and penetrating
mind of those that see into the supersensible.
"Let the sage refund his voice into his inner sense,
his inner sense into his conscious mind; let him refund
his mind into the great soul, and let hin> refund the
great soul into the quiescent Self.
The path of “ Arise, awake, go to the great teachers and learn.
release is fine
aa the edge of The wise affirm this to be a-sharp razor's edge hard to
arutor.
walk across, a difficult path.
" When a man has seen the Self, inaudible, intan¬
gible, colourless, undecaying, imperishable, odourless
without beginning and without end, beyond the mind,
ultimate and immutable,—when he has seen that, he
escapes the power of death.
" The sage that hears and recites this primeval nar¬
rative that Death recited and Machiketas heard is
worshipped as in the sphere of Self.
" If the purified sage rehearse this highest mystery
before an assembly of Brahmans, or to those present
at a ^raddha ceremony, it avails to endless recompense,
it avails to endless recompense.”
Self is said to be hidden within all living things, as
lying veiled beneath those fictitious presentments of the
senses that make up the experience of common life.
1 MSyg, AvidyS, the world-fiction, the cosmical illusion.
3 Purusha is here synonymous with Brahman.
 OF THE UPANISHATfS. 129

The aspirant to extrication from metempsychosis is to Ch«. v

melt away the visible and nameable semblances that
hide it from him; to cease to see the figments, and to
Bee only that which they replace; as a man may cease
to see the waters of the mirage, and may come to see
the sands of the desert in place of which they have
fictitiously presented themselves to his illusive vision,
The varied phases of fictitious life, and the varied
elemental environments of migrating souls; are to be
set aside by progressive abstraction and ecstatic vision;
they are like so many webs* of finer and finer tissue
woven across and across the Self, and veiling it. from
heedless eyes. In the descending order each successive
manifestation is more and more concrete; in the ascend¬
ing order each is more and more simple, fine, or subtile.
In the progress of abstraction each later is melted
away into each earlier manifestation ; the mind of the
aspirant rises to more and more subtile and supersen-
siuie emanations, until he arrives at that which lies
beyond them all, the Self that emanates from nothing,
and cannot be melted away into any principle from
which it has emanated. In a new metaphor he is then The liberated
said to have awakened from his dreaming vision of the wak« upVut
figments of the world-fiction to the intuition of his worSinto '
true, nature as one with the characterless and imper- roalb9i“*‘
sonal spiritual essence. To return to the text.
IV. “The self-existent Ilvara has suppressed the Fourthvam.
senses that go out towards the things of sense. 'These
senses then go out, not inwards to the Self. Here and
there a wise man with the craving for immortality\has
closed his eyes and seen the Self.
“ The unwise follow after outward pleasures and enter
into the net of wide-spread death; but the wise, who
Jknow what it is to be immortal, seek not for the imper¬
ishable amidst the things that perish.”
The net of death is metempsychosis,- the endless suc¬
cession of birth and death, decay and sickness. To bg-
 130 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chi?, v. immortal is not to be as the gods are, who live till the
dose of a period of evolution, but to be at one with
the transcendent Self. The state of the gods is said to
be a relative immortality:1 they are implicated in me¬
tempsychosis until they liberate themselves by self-
suppression and ecstatic meditation.
" What is left over as unknown td that Self by whiofi
the soul knows colour and taste and smell and noimri
and touch ? This is that;’
This is that, this is the imperishable principle in
man, as to the existence of which the gods themselves
are said to have been puzzled, the principle about
which Nachiketas has inquired, the spiritual reality
that manifests itself in the world of semblances.
•Then*#* “He that knows that this living soul that eats the
k°ney °f recompense, and is always near, is the Self, and
no fear, that it is the lord of all that all that has deen and all
that is to be, no longer seeks to protect himself from
anything. This is that.”
The sage that knows that his true nature is imperish¬
able, and that his bodily life is only a source of misery,
is exempt from fear, and there are no longer any perils
against which he can seek to protect himself. He has
won—
u A clear-escape from tyrannising lust.
And full immunity from penal woe; ”

and is one with the*universal soul, the deity that makes

the world, and one with Brahman.
"He sees the Self who sees Hiranyagarbha, that
emanated from the self-coercion of Livara, that came
forth before the elements, that has entered into the
cavity of the heart, and there abides with living, crea¬
tures. This is that
" He sees the Self who sees Aditi, one with all the
gods, who emanated out of Hiranyagarbha, and has
JM&cm&flanm aveutkSnam. amrita*
 OF THE UPAIUSHADS. 131

entei d into the cavity of the heart, and there abides Chap. V.
With, living creatures. This is that.
* Agni, the, fire that is hidden in the fire-drills as the
unborn*c^ild within the mother, to be adored day by
day by men as they wake and as they offer their obla¬
tions —this is that.”
Agni the fire-god, worshipped in the Vedic sacrifices*,
& here identified* with Hiragyagarbha, as also the fire
within the heart meditated Upon by the self-torturing
mystic or Yogin. Hiranyagarbha is said to be one with
Brahman, as an earring is one with the gold of which
it is made.
u All the gods are based upon that divine being
Hiranyagarbha, out of whom the sun rises, into whom
the sun sets. Ho one is beyond identity with that
divine being.. This is that.
f4 What the Self is in the world, that is it outside the
world; and what it is outside the world, that it is in
the world. From death to death he goes who looks on
this as.manifold/*
The Self manifested in every form of life, from a tuft It la illusion
that presents
of grass up to the highest deity, and passing in sem¬ the manifold
of experience.
blance from body to body, is the sanie with the Self
outside the world, Brahman per se, the characterless
thought beyond the fictions of metempsychosis. He
that sees in his individual soul an entity apart from
the universal soul, and other than the one impersonal
Self, retains his fictitious individuality, and must ass
from body to body so long as he retains it. Let d man
therefore see that he is one, with the one reality, the
characterless thought, that is, like the ether that is
everywhere, a continuous plenitude of being. It is
only illusion1 that presents the variety of experience, a
variety that melts away into unity oti the rise of the
ecstatic vision,. The many pass, the one abides.
tt It is to Le reached only with the inner sense; there
1 7
A /in,it >vrr>ratuupa8thnj)ihi ’vidyH,
 132 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chip. v. is nothing in it that is manifold. From death tc leath

— he goes who looks on this as manifold.
“ Purusha, the Self, is within the midst of the body,
of the size of a thumb, the lord of all that haabeen and
of all that is to he. He that knows this seeks no longer,
to protect himself. This is that.
ESw..°T. “ Purusha, of the size of a thumb, is like a smokeless
p<u« ughc. lights the lord of all that has'been and of all thaf is to

be. This alone is to-day and is to-morrow. This is

that.
"He that looks upon his bodily manifestations as
other than the Self, passes into them again and again,
as rain that has fallen on a hill loses itself among the
heights.
“ The soul of cue sage that knows the unity of souls
in the Self, is like pure water poured ou upon a level
surface.”
The Self is figuratively said to he of the size of a
thumb, inasmuch as it is manifested, in the mind, and
the mind is lodged in the cavity of the heart; in the
same way as the ether within a hollow cane may be
said to be of the same size as the hollow, whereas in
propriety this ether is one with the ether present every¬
where, one and undivided. Tbe soul of the sage that,
sees the unity of all things is compared to pure waiter
upon a level surface, as having returned to its proper
nature of pure undifferenced thinking. It is a unifor¬
ms of thought in which every particular character of
thought has been suppressed.
TO&TanL V. "The sage who meditates upon his body as an
eleven-gated city for the Self, without beginning, and.
of changeless thought, ceases to sorrow, is already
liberated, and liberated once for all. This is that.
vuiowHiwt. “ This is the all-permeating Self; it is the sun in the
firmament, the air in middle space, the fire on this
■ earth as its altar; it is the guest in the house.; it
dwells in men, it dwells in the gods, it dwells in the
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 133

sacrifices, it dwells in the shy ; it is born in the 'waters Chap. v.

in the shapes of aquatic animals, it is born on the earth
as barley, rice, and every other plant, it is born in the
sacrificial elements, it is bom on the mountains in the
form of rivers. It is the true, the infinite.
«It impels the breath upwards, it impels the descend¬
ing air of life downwards. Ail the senses bring their
offerings to this adorable being seated in tile midst of
the heart.
“When the spirit that is in the perishing body is
parted from it, what is left of the body ? This is that.
" Ho mortal lives by his breath or by the descend¬
ing vital air. They live by another principle in which
these vital airs reside.”
The scholiasts remark of the last three verses that vedimttc
they give the^roofs of the existence of the Self. These SSrtmlerf®
proofs are these:—The activities of the vital airs (onthe8®“'
which,.in Indian physiology, the functions of the viscera
are said to depend), and the functions of the senses and
the muscles, are for the sake of some conscious prin¬
ciple ulterior to themselves; the activity of unconscious
things being instrumental to the ends of conscious
beings, as the activity of a chariot is instrumental to
the ends of the person driving in it. Again, the body
implies a conscious tenant, as it loses all sense of
pleasure and pain on the departure of that tenant.
Again, the body is composite, and everything composite
exists for the sake of- something ulterior to itself,—a bed
for the sake of the sleeper, a house for the sake of the
inmates, and so forth. That there is an ultimate prin¬
ciple of reality beyond the plurality of experience, is
proved by the fact that the last residuum of all abstrac¬
tion is entity. After aU differences have one by one
been thrown away, the mind remains to the last filled
with the idea of being. And this ultimate reality is
proved to be spiritual, by that power of intuition to
which the aspirant to extrication may rise even in this
 134 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. v. life. He comes to see the light within the heart, the
light of consciousness in which the inodes of mind are
manifested. He puts away the duality of subject and
object as the fictitious outflow of the world-fiction,1 and
recovers the characterless bliss of unity, tbe fulness
of joy that is the proper nature of the soul as Self.
Every phase of happiness 2 ,m everyday experience is
only a fictitious portion' of th.at total blessedness, and
everything that is dear to us is dear only as it is one
with us in the unity of the beatific Self.8 To return to
the text.
Tt&tettTT <c^°> Gautama, I will again proclaim to thee this
do**. mystery, the everlasting Self, and how it is with the
Self after death.
“ Some souls pass to another birth to enter into
another; body, and some enter into vegetable lives,
according to their works, and according to their know¬
ledge.
“ The spirit that is awake in those that sleep, fasl nr
ing to itself enjoyment after enjoyment,—this is the
pure Self, this is the immortal; on this the spheres bf
recompense are based; beyond tliis none can pass. This
is that.
The Seif u like “A3 one and the same fire pervades a house and
flSTSItof shapes itself to the shape of everything, so the one Self
that is in all living things shapes itself to all their
several shapes, and is at the same time outside them.
“ As one and the same atmosphere pervades a house
and shapes itself to the shape of everything, so the one
Self that is in all living things shapes itself to all their
several shapes, and is at the same time outside them,
smite of the a As the sun, the eye of all the world, is unsullied by
visible external impurities, so the one Self that is within
down upoo.
1 iVtreafe ymd$akriU vu&aj/avis- s Lauktko Ay anando brakmd*-
MagUnikdge vidyagd tvabhdvtkah andamawa mdtrd.
pftnpSrxa eka dnando ’dvaite 6ka- 1 AtmaprUh&dkanaiv&d gm
nmyatra prttif.
 OF THE UPANJSHADS. 135

ell living tilings is not soiled by the miseries of migra- Chat, v.

tion, and is external to them. —
“ The wise' see within their own heart the one and*
only lcfcd, thG Self that is in all living things, that makes
its one form to become many; and everlasting bliss is
for them and not for others.
w The wise see within their own heart the one thing
that perishes not in all things that perish; the one thing them only
that, gives light in all things that have no light: the one light of the*
being that gives the recompense to many; and peace own heart*,
eternal is for them and not for others.
“ This is that, so think they; this is the unspeakable,
the bliss above all bliss. How shall I come to know
that bliss ? does it shine forth, does it reveal itself ?
“ 1The sun gives no light to that, nor the moon and
stars; neither do these lightnings light it up; how then
should this fire of ours ? All things shine after .it as it
shines, all this world is radiant with its light.
VL This .everlasting holy fig-tree stands with roots sixth vnu
above, with branches downwards. Its root is that pure
Self, that immortal-principle. All the spheres of recom¬
pense have grown up upon it, and no man can pass
beyond it This is that.
"All.this world, whatever is, trembles in that living
breath; it has come forth and stirs with life. They
that know this, the great awe, the uplifted thunderbolt,
become immortal
“2In awe of this, fire gives heat; in awe of this, the
sun scorches; in awe of this speed Xndra and Vayu,
and the Death-god speeds besides those other four.
*If a man has been able to see this in this life before
his body falls away from him, he is loosed from future
embodiments. If not, he is fated to further embodi¬
ments in future ages and future spheres of recompense.

1 This verse occurs also in the 8 A similar verse occurs m t&e

seoopd section of the seoopd . Taittiriva Upanfohad. See above,
daka. See above, p. 106. P- 82,
 13S THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. V. “ This Self is seen in the heart as in a mirror, in the

sphere of the forefathers as in a dream, in the sphere of
the Gandharvas as on a watery surface, in the sphere
of Brahma as in light and shade.”
The world-tree Brahman, it has been seen, is the seed of thewoild-
and the seed
from which it tree, and Maya is the power of growth residing in the
springs.
seed. Here Brahman is said to he the root of the
world-tree. The world of semblances is a tree, and may
be cut down with the hatchet of ecstatic vision. It
grows up upon Brahman as its root, out of the world-
fiction Maya as its seed. Hiranyagarbha is the sprout¬
ing seed. It is watered by the cravings of migrating
souls, whose actions through-the law of retribution pro¬
long the existence of the spheres of metempsychosis.
Its fruits are the pleasure and pains of living things.
The spheres of recompense are the ne°ts in which,
deities and migrating souls dwell like birds. It rustles
with the cries, the weeping, and the laughter, of the
souls in pain or for the moment happy. It is like a
holy fig-tree in constant agitation, tremulous to the
breeze of emotion and of action. Its pendulous branches
are the paradises, places of torment, and spheres of
good and evil recompense. It is in constant growth
and change, varying from moment to moment. It is
unreal as the imagery of a reverie,* as the waters of a
mirage, and vanishes away in the light of intuition of
the one and only truth, the Self beyond it. The Self
in its earliest manifestation as ISvara is the great awe;
the being in fear of whom the sun and moon and stars,
and all the powers of nature, perform their never-ceasing,
ministrations. The sage is urged to strive with all his
force to rise to the intuition of the Self, before he quits
bis present body. In this life he can see the light
within his heart in the polished mirror of a purified
mind. In the sphere of the Pitris or forefathers of the
tribes, to which the soul of the worshipper of the deities
proceeds, he can see it faintly and dimly only as in a
 OP THE VPANISHADS. *37 •

dream, for in that sphere the. soul is engrossed in the cur, y.

enjoyment of its reward. In the sphere of the Gand-
harvas, he can see it only fitfully reflected as on a
ruffled sheet of water. In the sphere of Brahma, the
highest deity, it may indeed her seen as a thing is seen
in the sunlight and in the shade, hut this sphere is
promised only to the rarest merit, and the sage may
fail to win it. To return to the test.
“ The wise man knows that the senses are hot him¬
self, and that they rise and set as they have severally
issued forth, and knowing this he grieves no more.
• “ The inner sensory is beyond the senses, the mind
-is higher than the inner sensory, the great soul Hirajj-
yagarbha is higher than the mind, and the undeveloped
principle1 is higher than that great soul..
“ The su reme Purusha * is beyond the undeveloped
principle, pervading all things, characterless; and the
migrating soul that knows this Purusha is loosed'from
etempsychosis, and passes into immortality.
“ Its form is not in anything visible; no man has seen Tb«s«uiato
this Self with his eyes: it is seen as revealed by the »££££&»
heart, the mind, the spiritual intuition. They that
know this Self become immortal. “pJr*at
* 'When the five senses and the inner sense are at
rest, and'when the mind ceases to act, they call this
the highest state.
“They account this motionless suspension of the senses Eectatie
to be the ecstatic union. This is the unintermittentaonmij
union, for union has its furtherances and hindrances.
' “ The Self is not to be reached with voice, or thought,
-or eye.. How shall it be known otherwise than as he -
knows it who says only .that it is?
“ It is,—only thus is the Self to be kuown, and as
that which is .true .in both that which is and that which
is not Its real nature reveals itself only when it is
known as. that which is.
1 *9 Brahmin*
 THE PHILOSOPHY

, cun; v. “ When all the desires that lie in his heart areshakeh
off, the mortal becomes immortal, and in this life rejoins
the Self.
“When-all his heart’s ties already in thisjife are
broken off, the mortal becomes immortal.- Thu is the
whole of thh sacred doctrine.”
agttn The aspirant must become passionless. If he. de-
tnswftb* sire anything he will act to get it, and .action is-fol-
£mulowed by recompense in this or in a future body. All
desire arises from the illusion by which, a man views
his animated organism as himself. Action, good and
evil alike, serves only to prolong the miseries of migra¬
tion, by giving rise to retributive experience. The
aspirant must learn the falsity of plurality, the ficti¬
tious nature of the duality in experience, and the sole
reality of the supersensible and unitary Sel* He must
crush every sense and suppress every thought, that his
mind may become a mirror to reflect the pure, charac¬
terless being, thought,-and bliss. Its everyday expe¬
rience is a dream of the soul, and it is only by sup¬
pressing this experience that it awakes to its proper
nature. It is true that the Self is not to be reached by
desire or thought; but if it be argued that it is not,
for if it were it would be reached, the reply, says 6an-
karaeharya, is as follows. The Self is, for it may be
reached as the ultimate principle from which all things
have, emanated. Befund by progressive efforts of ab¬
straction each successive entity in the world of sem¬
blances into the entity out of which it emanated;
ascend through the series of emanations to the more
and more rarefied, the less and less determinate; do
this, and you will find, at the end of this process, the
idea of being. The final mode of mind, is not non¬
entity but entity.1 The mind, after thus resolving all
things into the things from which they came, is itself
1 Yadipi vu&ayapracUdpanena pmv3&pyam&n& huddkit tacUtpi u
tatp/iOi/afagarikaita viByaU.
 cm THE VPA NISHA DS. 139

resolvfed; jet as it melts away it melts away in the Ciur.T.

form of existence and fall of the idea of being; and
the mind is our only informant as to what is and is
not’j Again; another reply is, that if non-existence were
the root of the world, all the things of the world that
have successively come into manifestation would mani¬
fest themselves as non-existent This is not the case;
these things manifest themselves as existent, as an
.earthenware vessel manifests itself as made of earth.
It is only as apart from that which underlies them
that these things are non-existent, "a modification of
speech- only, a change, a name.” The Self is “ true in
both that which is, and that which is not,” it is true in
its proper nature as the fontal characterless essence,
'and true underneath the figments of the world-fiction
that illusively overspread, it. The desires are said to
lie in the heart. The feelings, passions, thoughts, and
volitions are modes of mind, and the mind is lodged in
tfle heart When these modes are blown out like a
•lamp, the personality passes away into the imperson¬
ality of Brahman. To proceed with the text.
“ There are a hundred and one arteries to the heart, n» wni-t
and one of these issues up through the head. Going
upwards by that artery a sage ascends to immortality. smSSt*0*
The other arteries proceed in all directions.”
The coronal artery, sushumna, is the passage by which
the soul of the aspirant to extrication from metempsy¬
chosis ascends to the sphere of Brahma, there to sojourn
till it wills its reabsorption into the pure spiritual
essence Brahman. The other arteries -are the passages
through which the soul issues out to new embodiments.
“Qf the size of a thumb, the Purusha, the Self within,
is ever seated in the hearts of. living things. The sage
should patiently extract it from his body, as he might
extract the pith out of a reed; and he should learn that
that Self is pure and immortal, pure and immortal.
“ Thus Nachiketas received this gnosis revealed by
 THE PHILOSOPHY

Obat.v. thd god of death, together with all the precepts tor
ecstatic union; he reached the Self, .and became free
from good and evil, and immortal; and so will any
other sage become who thus knows the fontal spiritual
essence.
-“May he preserve us both, may he reward us both.
May we put forth our strength together, and may that
which we recite be efficacious. ■ May we never 4eel
enmity against each other. Oil Peace, .peace, peace.
Hari. ' Om.”
The formula with which the Kafha Upanishad closes
has already several times occurred in these pages. It
is intended to secure the co-operation of the universal
soul or Deminrgus, and the safe tradition and recep¬
tion of its doctrines of gnosis and ecstatic vision by
teacher and disciple.
Theoiiogory One of the most striking passages in this Upanishad
pianpand is the allegory of the chanot in the third section. The
tome fgnra in migrating soul is said to be seated in the body as m
a chariot The mind is the charioteer, the will is the
■ reins, the senses are the horses, and the journey is
either towards fresh embodiments or towards Telease
from metempsychosis. This allegory of the chariot
has often been compared with the Platonic figure in
the Phsedrus, in which the souls of gods and of men in
'file' ante-natal state are pictured as a charioteer in a
chariot with a pair ofwinged horses. The charioteer
is Idle reason. In the chariots of the gods both horses
are excellent, with perfect wings; in the hninan chariot
one of the horses is white and fully winged, the other
black and unruly, with .imperfect or half-grown wings.
The white horse typifies the rational impulse, and the
black violent and rebellious horse represents the sen¬
sual and concupiscent elements of human nature. In
these chariots gods and men ascend to the vision of
the intelligible archetypes of things, men for ever
. slipping down again to intercourse only with the things
 OF THE UFANISHADS. *4*

offense, to feed upon opinion, and no longer upon chap.'

truth.
" 2Jow the winged horses and charioteers of the gods
are all of taem good and of good breed, while those of
men are mixed. We have a charioteer who drives them
in a pair, and one of them is excellent and of excellent
origin, and the other is base and of base origin; and
necessarily it is hard and troublesome to manage them,.
The teams of the gods, evenly poised, glide upwards in
obedience to the rein; but the others have a difficulty,
for the horse that has evil in him, if he has not been
thoroughly broken in by the charioteer, goes heavily,
inclining towards the, earth, and depressing the driver.”
The- gods ascend to the heaven above the heavens,
the place of pure truth, and there contemplate the
colourless and figureless ideas. “ This is the life of the
gods, but of the other souls that which follows the gods
best and is likest to them lifts the head of the charioteer
into the outer region, and is carried round in the revo¬
lution of the worlds, troubled with the horses, and
seeing the ideas with difficulty. Another rises above
and dips below the surface of the upper and outer region,
and sees and again fails to Bee, owing to the restiveness
•of its team. The rest of. the souls are also 1/wofog
after the upper world, and they all fallow; but not
being strong enough, they sink below the surface as
they are carried round, plunging, treading on one an¬
other, striving to be first. There is' confusion, and
conflict, and the extremity of effort, and many of them
are lamed or have their wings broken through the ill-
driving of the charioteers; and all of them, after a long-
toil, depart without being initiated into the spectacle
of being, and after their departure are fain to feed upon
the. food of opinion. The reason why the soids show
this great eagerness to see. the field of truth is. that
pasturage is found in that meadow suited to the higher*,
part of the soul, and to the growth of the pinions cm
 THE PHILOSOPHY

ohap. v. which the soul flies lightly upwards.' And .the law of
Nemesis is this, that the soul which, in company. «uth
the gods, has seen something of the truth, shall .Tem&in
unharmed until the next great revolution of the> world,
and the soul that is able always to do so shall be un¬
harmed for ever. But when a soul is unable to keep
pace, and'fails to see, and through some mishap is filled
with forgetfulness and vice, and weighed down, and
sheds its plumage, and falls to the earth beneath the
weight, the law is that this soul shall not in it3 first birth
pass into the shape of any other animal, but only into
that of man. The soul ’that ha3 seen most- of truth
shall come to the birth as a philosopher, or lover of
beauty, or musician, or amorist; that which has seen
truth in the second degree shall be a righteous king, or
warrior, or lord; the soul, that is of a thircL-order shall
be a politician, or economist, or trader; the fourth shall
be a lover of hard exercise, or gymnast, or physician;
the fifth shall have the life of a soothsayer or hiero¬
phant; to the sixth the life of a poet or some, kind of
imitator will be suitableto the seventh the life uf an
artisan or husbandman; to the eighth that of a pro-’
fessor or a people’s man; to the ninth that of a tyrant
In all these varieties of life he who fives righteously
obtains a better lot and he who lives unrighteously a
worse one.” The soul of him that has never seen a
glimpse of truth will pass into the human form, but
into some lower form of life. “ The intellect of the1
philosopher alone Recovers its wings, for it is ever
dwelling in memory upon those essences, the vision
of. which makes the gods themselves divine. He is
ever being initiated into perfect mysteries,, and alone
becomes truly perfect... Bat as he forgets human inte¬
rests and is rapt in the divine, the many think that
he is beside himself and check him'; they fail .to see’
that he is inspired.”
 OF THE UPANJSHADS. *43

CHAPTER VI.
THE BRIHADARANYAKA UPANISHAD.

M The thing visible, nay the thing imagined, the thing in any way
conceived as visible, what is it but a garment; a clothing of the higher
celestial, invisible, unimaginable, formless, dark with excess of bright.
This so solid-seeming world, after all, ds bat an air-image over He, the
only reality * and nature, with its thousand-fold production and de¬
struction, but the reflex of our own inward force, the phantasy of our
dream; or what the earth-snirit in Faust names it, the living visible
garment of Goc1
“ In being’s flood, in action's storm,
I walk and work, above, beneath,
Work and weave in endless motion,
Birth and death,
Ah infinite ocean;
A seizing and a giving
The fire of living:
Us thus tjut at the roaring loom of time I ply,'
And tom for God the garment than seest him by.**
—Cabltlx.

Mast of the most impressive utterances of the. primi¬ Chap. VX

tive Indian philosophy are to be.foimd in the Bjihad-
Sragyaka. Upanishad, a long treatise on the science, of
Brahman, forming the last portion of the Satapatha-
bi&hma^a, the legendary and liturgic dissertation an¬
nexed to the Vajasaneyisamhita, or so-called White
Recension of the Yajufeveda. A passage treating of
renunciation,, ecstasy,, and the liberation of the soul
has been already laid before the reader in the third
chapter, of this work. The present chapter will present
the greater part of the narratives and dialogues of this
Upanishad that relate to the revelation of the Self,
 »44 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chat, vl with a fe'w words of explanation from the scholiasts

interposed from time to time.
xb« sjihadar* The earlier part of the ByihadSrapyaka Upanishad,
SZi^' setting forth the mystic significance of the>,A£vaai£dha
or horse-sacrifice, and relating the generation of the
world by Prajapati or Parasha, may be passed over.
The first extract selected* is the dialogue bet'w en
Gaigya and Ajataiatru. . It is as follows:—
Dialogue of “ Once upon a time there lived the' proud son of
udt£«aur- Balaka, a Gargya, an able reciter of ancient learning.
®*’ On a particular occasion he visited Ajatasatrn, the
Baja of Kail, and said: Let me expound Brahman to
you. Ajatafetra Teplied: I will give you a thousand
head of cattle as a return for your instruction, for
people go about with the idea that a liberal man is the
best disciple.
“ The Gargya said: I meditate upon the Purusha, e
divine spirit that is in the sun, as the Sell* Ajata&tru
said: Nay, never teach me of such a Self as that,
meditate upon the Self as that which stands beyond;'
the head of all things, the king of all things.. He* that
meditates upon the Self in this manner stands beyond,
the head of all things, the king of all things.”'
The being that the Gargya identifies with the Self
is his own individual soul, Brahman as it is marnfftatad
in the sun and in the eye, and that through the eye
has entered into the hearts of living things, and seems
to know and act and suffer in the world of semblances.
He finds the Self in his own body, and senses;
Ajataiatru at once rejects this presentation of the Self
as inadequate; he himself already meditates tipoh the
Self in a highet manifestation. lIt is- a Hindu ma im
that a man rises to that grade of being under which he
meditates upon Brahman. The Gargya proceeds to.
enumerate a variety of other manifestations under
which he meditates upon the sole spiritual -fimpTW*.
1 YaM yatko tad eva bjiava#,
 OF THE PPANISHABS, *45

As in the first instance lie fonnd Brahman in the sun ckat.vi

and ' the organ of vision, of which the son-god is the ~~r"
tutelary deity, so next he finds Brahman in the moon
and in the inner sense) or common sensory, of which
the moon -god' is the tutelary deity.
“ Jhe Gargya said: I meditate upon the Purusha, the
divine being that is in the moon, as the Self. Ajataiatru
'said: Hay, never teach me of such a Self as that; I
meditate upon the Self as the great, white-robed Soma,
the king. If a man meditate upon. the. Self in this
wise, his soma libation is pressed out and poured forth
day by day, and his food does not fail.
“ The Gargya said: I meditate upon the Purusha, the
divine being that is in the lightning, as the Sell
^AjStafotru said: Hay, never teach me of such a Self as
that I meditate uppn the Self as the glorious being.
He that meuitates upon the Self in this wise becomes
glorious, and his progeny becomes glorious.
“ The Girgya said: I meditate upon the Purusha, the
divine being that is in the ether, as the Self. Ajacaiatru
said: Hay, never teach me of such a Self as that I
meditate upon that which fills all things and is inopera¬
tive as the Sell He that meditates upon the Self in
this wise has the fulness of offspring and of flocks and
herds, apd his posterity is never cut off in this world.
* The Gargya said: I meditate npon the Parasha, the
divine being that is in the air, as the Self. Ajatalatru
said: Hay, never teach me of such a Self as that I
meditate upon the Self as Indta the unassailable, and
as the pever-vanqdished host of the Maruts. He that
meditates upon the Self in this wise becomes-an in¬
vincible victor, the vanquisher of the aliens.
“The GSrgya said: I meditate npopthe- Puruaha,
the divine being that id in fire, as the Sell Ajataiatm
said':! Hay, never teach me of such a Self as.that I
meditate upon the Self as the sustained He that
meditates upon the Self in. this way becomes a sus-
,K
 146 THE PHILOSOPHY.

cha?. ti tamer of taings, and his posterity become sustain^s of

things.
“ The Gargya said: I meditate upon the Purusha, the
divine being that is in water, as the Self. AjSta&tru
replied: Hay, never teach me of such a Self £s that I
meditate upon the Self as that which is in conformity
with prescriptive ordinances. If a man meditate upon
the Self in this wise, the fruit of such conformity
accrues to him, and a religious son is bora to him.
“The Gargya said: I meditate upon the Purusha, the
divine being that is seen upon a mirror, as the Sell
Ajata&tra said: Nay, never teach me of such a Self pa
that I meditate upon the Self as the shining being.
If a man meditate upon the Self in this way, he shines,
his children shine, and he outshines all men that he-
meets with.
“The Gargya said: I meditate upon the sound of
my footsteps as the Self. Ajata&tru said: Nay, never
teach me of such a Self as that I meditate upon
Self as the breath of life. If a man meditate upon the
Self in this wise, he lives out hfi whole life in this
world, and his-breath does not fail him before his day.
“ The Gargya said: I meditate upon the Purusha, the
divine being that is in the regions of space, as the Self.
Ajataistru said: Nay, never teach me of such a Self as
that I meditate upon the Self as the companion
never leaves me. If a man meditate upon the Self in
tins way, he has friends, and his friends-are never
parted from him.
“ The GSrgya said: I meditate upon the Purusha, the
divine being that is my shadow, as the Self. Ajatalatm
said: Nay, never teach me of such a Self as that I
meditate upon death as the Sell If a man meditates
upon the Self a* this way, he lives out all his days in
this life, doee bot -oome to him before his
hour.
“ The Gargya said: I meditate, upon the Purusha, the
 OF THE UPANISSADS. .147

divine being that is-in the mind, as the Self. Ajatalatru ona. VL
said: Nay, never teach me of such a Self as that I
meditate upon the Self as that which has peace of mind.
If a man meditate upon the Self in this manifestation,
he has peace of mind in this life, and his children have
peace of mind. After this the Gargya held his peace.”
Balaki the Gargya knows the Self in its particular
and local manifestations, as it presents itself fictitiously
in the shape of the gods, in the forces of nature, and in
the hearts and minds of living things. He does not know
the Self as it is in its own nature, the Self per se, the
Self'unmanifested, the nirgunam brahma, the mukhyam
brahma.; and Ajatalatru the prince, finding that the
Gargya is put to shame and has nothing more to say,
has to instruct the Brahman in his own Brahmanic
lore. '
“ Ajatalatru asked, Is this all you have to say.? The
Gargya replied, It is all. Ajatalatru said: The Self is
tfCtrieamt by anything you have said so far. The
Gargya said: Let -me wait upon you as your disciple.
“Ajatalatru said: It is preposterous that a Brahman
should come to a Kshatriya to be taught about the
Self, but I will teach you. So he stood up and took
him by the hand, and they went to a.place where a ottiMStu*
man was lying asleep. The Baja called to him by the «»u*h0**
names, Great white-robed King Soma, hut he did not
rise fie patted him with his hand and woke him,
and the man stood up.
“ Ajatalatru said: When, this man was fast -asleep
where was his conscious soul, and where has it oome
from back to him ? The Gargya did not know wlt*i to
say.
“Ajatalatru said: When the conscious soul was
asleep within him, it was iu the atfpr ib his heart,
' and had withdrawn into itself the jcaowledge that
arises from the intimations of the senses. When the
soul withdraws these into-itself, it is said to sleep in
 14& THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. VL the dreamless state; its sense is withdrawn into itself,

its speech is withdrawn, its' sight is withdrawn, its
hearing is withdrawn, its inner sense is withdrawn.
But when the soul enters into the dreaming state
the retributive experiences present themselves,'and the
man seems to himself to be, it may he a great Baja, or,
it may he a great Brahman, or he passes into bodies
higher or lower than those of man. If he'seenurto he
a great Baja, he seems to have his subjects, and to live
as he pleases in. his kingdom. In this way it is that
ho has withdrawn the outer senses into the inward
sense, and lives as he wills withiu his own person.
“ But when the soul returns to dreamless sleep and
is no longer cognisant of anything, it retires- hy way of
the seventy-two thousand arteries that proceed out of
the heart and ramify throughout the body, into the
body and reposes in it. It passes into the state of
highest blis3 and sleeps at peace like a child, lil™ a
-great prince or BrShman. It is thus that the spirit
rests in dreamless sleep.
“ All the senses, all the spheres of recompense, all
the gods, and all living things proceed in all their
diversity out of this Self, in like manner as a spider
issues out. of itself in the form of its threads, and as
the little sparks fly on all sides out of a Are. The
mystic name of this Self is the true in the true: the
senses are true, and the Self is the truth of them;”
AjataSatru thus teaches Balaki that TWhmyi fe
the one and only Self, that manifests itself in the
seemibg plurality of souls in their three states of
diteanless sleep, dreaming sleep, and waging experi-
enoa. The peaceful state of the undreaming sleeper,
m which the duality of subject and object has for the
time melted away, is the highest, manifestation of the
one-divine life that lives in all things. In this state
the sofil recovers its native parity; it is like water teat
i has been purified from previous discolorations. To-
 OF THE UPANISHADS. *49

sleen without dreaming is to be released awhile from our. vj.

the miseries of metempsychosis. To be for ever in
such a state would be final peace and blessedness, the
devoutly-to-be-wisBed-for consummation. In the state
of' dreamless sleep' the Self is said to permeate the
whole body, as fire penetrates and permeates a redhot
mass of iron. In the state of dreaming sleep the
sense* are withdrawn through the arteries into the
mind1- within the-heart, and the inner sensory9 pre¬
sents a series of images that simulate the objects of
perception. On awaking,, the organs of sense and
motion are sent out of the mind te their several sta¬
tions in the body through the network of the arteries.
In dreaming and in • waking the modes of the mind
shine, that is, rise into consciousness, in the light of
the Self thatjdwells in the. heart. In dreamless sleep
there are no modes of mind to be lighted up, for the
mind is for the time melted away. The Self is said at
tnat time to permeate the body, only in the sense that1
it is ready to reillumine the mind so soon as it shall
reappear. Brahman is said to be the true in the true.
Brahman is that out of which all things arise, that
upon which they abide in false presentment, and that
into which they disappear again. All things are the
five elements, or made of the five elements, in their
supersensible or their sensible manifestation. The
mind and the senses are themselves made of the super¬
sensible elements. The elements are designated name
and colour; name and colour are said to be th$ true,
and Brahman is that which is true in this true.
The next dialogue in the Brihadarapyaka Upsnishad
is that between the Bishi Tajfiavalkya and his wife
^daitreyL Yajiavalkya is on the point of quitting the
ties of home to become, a religious mendicant, that he
may be able to ponder on the emptiness of life nnd
to seek reunion with the one and only being, the im¬
personal Self.
1 BttitOU. * ifaiuu.
 150 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. VL “ Yajhavalkya said: Maitreyl, I am about "to leave

Di*logT»of this “home-life; come, let me divide the property be¬
YtiftmlkTa
&nd hia wife tween thee and my other wife, KatyayanI
“ Maitreyl said: If all this earth were mine -and full
of riches, should I he any the more immortal ? . No,
replied YajiiavalkyH; your life would he like the life
of other wealthy people; hut as “for immortality, there
is no hope of that from riches.
“ Maitreyl said: What am 1 to do with a thing that
will not make me immortal ? Tell me, holy lord, the
thing that thou knowest. Yajfiavalkya said: I love
you indeed, and I love what you now say 7 come, sit
down, and I will tell you, and you must think deeply
about what I say.
Thing* that
are dear Are
“ He said: A husband is loved, not for love of the
dear for the
Bake ef the
husband, but the husband is loved for love of the Self
Belt that is one within us all. A wife is loved, not for love
of the wife, but a wife is loved for love of the Sell
Children are loved, not for love of the children* but
children are loved for love of the Sell Wealth is
loved, not for love of wealth, but wealth is loved for
love of the Sell The Brahmanic order is loved, not
for the love of that order, but for the love of the Self.
The Kshatriya order is loved, hot for the love of that
order, but for the.love of the Self. The spheres of re¬
compense are loved, not for the love of those spheres,
hut for the love of the Self. The gods are loved, not
for the love of the gods,, but the gods are loved for love
of the Self. living things are loved, not for love of
the living things, hut for love of the Self. The world
is loved, not for love of the world, but the World is
loved for love of the Self that is one in all things. Ah!
It tithe Self Maitreyl it is the Self that one must see, and hear
that la to be
about, and think about, and meditate upon. All this
world is known by seeing the Self, by hearing about it,
flunking about it, meditating upon it.”
These expressions look strange and' not very lucid.
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 15*
but tie words must be taken to represent a nascent Coat, vx
feeling that there is a universal and impersonal element ~
in every form of interest, attachment, love, and worship,
and that in tnese the individual rises above his usual
limitations. All other love, say the scholiasts, is im¬
perfect ; the love of the Self that is one in all things,
albneds perfect; all other love has fictitious limitations,
the love of‘the Self alone is illimitable. And therefore
it is that the Self is what one has to see, and that the
aspirant must turn his back on all things that he may
come to see it. First he is to hear about it in the
teaching of his spiritual guide and in the words of
revelation; next it is to be thought about in the exer¬
cise of the understanding; next it is to be meditated
upon in prolonged ecstasy; and, last of all, the inner
vision rises dear, within the purified mind, so soon as
all the semblances of the world have been melted away
into their fontal unity by a never-failing effort of ab¬
straction. Then and not till then he shall have reached
the only satisfying love and blessedness. The words,
It is the Self that one must see, and hear about, and
think about, and meditate upon,1 form one of the texts
of highest importance, and most frequent citation in the
philosophy of the TTpanishads. To return to the* text
“The Brahmanic order would reject any one who
should view the Brahmanic order as elsewhere than in
-the Self. The Kshatriya order would reject anyone
who should regard the Kshatriya order.as elsewhere
than in the Self. The sphered of recompense would
reject any one who should regard the .spheres as else¬
where than in the Self. The gods would reject any one
who should view the gods as elsewhere than in the Self,
• AJ1 living things would reject any one that should view
the living things as elsewhere than in the Self. All
things would reject any one that should view all tilings
asdsewhere than in the Sell This Brahmanic order,
1 At*4 vtfrt dratkfavyak frvtatyo manta*)m itktidhgatitavyab.
 tSa THE PHILOSOPHY

Can. vx. this. Kshatriya order, these spheres, these gods, +hese
■living things, this all, are the Self.
AUthjtafitn “ All various things are the one and only Self, in the
Mjwrti*?8*1*’ same manner as -when they beat a drum & inan cannot
catch the various external sounds, but the one total
Bound is caught by listening to the drum or to the
*"**■ beating of the drum;
»Xn the oarna manner as when they blow a ctfnch-
shell a man cannot catch the various external sounds,
but the one total sound is caught by listening to the
conch-abell or to the blast up,on the shell;
“ In the same manner as token they touch a lute a
Twtm cannot catch the various external sounds, but the
one total.sound is caught by listening to the lute or the
performance on the lute.
n»v«d»»r» “Smoke issues forth on every side fr m a fire laid
c?fiSft«on with moist fuel. Even so the Rigveda, Yajurveda,
Samaveda, Atharvangirasa, the legendaries, the sayings
of the ancient sages, the theogonies, the sacred texts
and memorial verses of the Upanishad3, the aphorisms,
the explanations of the texts,-—rise as an exhalation
out of that great being. All these are exhalations of
that Self.
”• Ihe Self is that into which all things pass away,
even' as'the ocean is the one thing iito which all waters -
flow; as the touhh is the sense in which all modes of
tactual feeling meet.; a.s the sight is the sense in which
all feelings of colour meet; as the hearing is the sense
in which-all feelings of sound meet; as-the common
sensory is the organ in which all the volitions find
their unity ; as the heart is the place where all the
modes of pind are unified; as the hands ace the organs
in which all forms of manual activity are. at one; a?
the feet are those in which all modes of locomotion are
- centred; as the voice is the organ in which all repetitions
of the Yeda are at one.
“ A lump of salt thrown into water melts awav into
 OF THE VPA NISHA DS. 35$

th water, and no one can take it out, but wherever any Chap. vx
one takes up the water it is salt. Even so, Maitreyl,
is this great, this endless, impassable being a pure in¬
difference of thought A man comes out of these
elements, and passes back into them as they, pass away, the Hb«at*d
and after he has passed away there is no more con-1*8*’
sciousness. This is what I have to tell you, Maitreyl,
said Yajhavalkya”
This dialogue of Yajfiavalkya and Maitreyl is repeated
with variations farther on in the Erihadara^yaka, and
the last verse is there: “ This Self has nothing inside
it of outside it, in the same way as a lump of salt has
nothing inside it or outside it, but is one mass of savour.
The Self is a pure indifference of thought. A man rises
from these elements, and passes' back into them again
as they ]iaps away, and there is no consciousness after
he has passed away/' The figure of the salt and the
salt water is one of the commonplaces of the philosophy
of the Upanishads, and has already occurred, as the
.reader will recollect,, in the dialogue between Aru^i
and !§vetaketu in the Chhandogya UpanishacL The
body, the senses, and the mind are said to be emana¬
tions of the sensible and of the supersensible elements.
Every individual soul is the Self itself in fictitious
limitation to such and such a mind and.body. At the
end of every seon the bodies and the minds of all living
things, as well as their environments, are dissolved and
return into Maya, and their souls return into unity with
Brahman. Every personality melts away into the im¬
personality pf Brahman, as the lump of salt is lost in
the uniformity of the salt water. All living things are
bubbles and foam that return to the water they issued
from. All the bodies and minds of living things are
like pools that reflect fhe sun; the pools disappear, and
the sun alone remains. Or, to reproduce another Indian
simile, they are like flowers of various hues, that impart
their own colour to the pure and colourless crystal of
 *54 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chat, vl the Self; the flowers are withdrawn, and the crystal is
— pure and colourless again. There is no consciousness
for the soul freed for the time or freed for ever from
the body, the senses, and the mind; there ds only the
state of characterless bliss beyond personality and
beyond consciousness, unthinkable and ineffable. To
return.
“ Maitreyl said: Holy sir, thou hast bewildered Tne
. by saying that there is no consciousness after one has'
passed away. Yajhavalkya answered her: I have said
nothing bewildering, but only what may well be under*
stood.
The duality of “For where there is as it were a duality, one sees
ShjeSfaBa- another, one smells another, one hears another, one
speaks to another, one thinks about another, one
knows another; but where all this world ia Self alone,
what should one smell another with, see another
with, hear another with, speak to another with, think
about another with, know another with ? Kow
should a man know that which he knows all this
world with? Wherewithal should a man know the
knower?”
The dialogue of YajAavalkya is followed by the Mad-
huvidya or allegory of hohey, in which the following
verses may be noticed:—
“ The body is the honey of all living things, and all
living things are the honey of this body; and this same
luminous immortal Purusha that is in the body and
this same luminous immortal Self are one. Purusha
is Self. This is immortal, this is Brahman, this is all
that is.
“ This same Self is the lord over all liviug things, the
king oi all living things. All living things, all the
gods, all the spheres, all the faculties, all souls are con¬
centred in the Self, as the spokes of a wheel are all
fixed in the axle and the felly.
“ This is the honey that Dadhyach the son of Atharvan
 OF THE UPANISHADS. I5S

proclaimed to the Aivins. Seeing this, the Rishi has Chap, vi

said: This Self shaped itself after the shape of every- aen^i-
thing, that it might unfold its essence. India1 appears "ngffJffSL
multiform -by his illusions, for his horses are yoked,
hundreds and ten. This Self is the hprses (the senses), S^ment*ct
this is the'ten (organs of sense and motion), this is the
many thousands, the innumerable (living souls). This
same Self* has nothing before it or after it, nothing inside
it or outside it This Self is Brahman and is omniscient.
Such is the doctrine.”
The' fourth book of the Brihadaranyaka Upauishad
introduces us to a public disputation on the import of
various elements of sacrificial worship, and on the know¬
ledge that liberates the soul, between the Rishi Yajfta-
valkya and the Brahmans present at a sacrifice offered
by Janaka^he Raja of Videha or Tirhut. The ceremony
was thronged with visitors, who came either at the invi¬
tation of the prince, or of their own accord, to see the
spectacle, some Brahmans having come from the lands
of the Kurus and Panchalas in the distant north. The
stoTy is as follows:—
“ Janaka, the Raja of Yideha, performed a sacrifice, ThedUput*-
and gave numerous gifts to those that came.to it^S^cSie-
Brahmans from the countries of the Kurus and Pan-
chalas had come to he present at it A desire arose in
the mind of Janaka to know which of all these Brah- thepri*!*
mans was the most proficient in the repetition of the
sacred text He accordingly had a thousand head of
cattle driven into a pen, the horns of each being over¬
laid with ten measures of gold.8
"He said: Holy Brahmans, let him that is mostnj&mikri
learned of yon all drive off these cattle. Hot one of pri» without
them took upon himself to do so. YajfiavaJkya said to dSpot*.
tkxu
1 Indra 4s I&vara. Isvara aj> proceed cot of the elements that
pears in a fictitious plurality of emanate from M&yS.
forms, by illusively entering into 9 Of. Odyssey, iii. 426; Tibnlhae
and identifying himself with the Eleg., Iv. 1. 15.
plurality of bodies and minds that
 156 THE PHILOSOPHY

. An ip vl his disciple, Good Samairavas, drive these cattle to

— my house; and the youth did as he was bid. The'
Brahmans were angry, thinking, Why should this
think himself more learned than any of us'all ? Now
•Janaka had a Hofcfi priest named Advala, and Advala
asked Yajfiavalkya, Yajfiavalkya, art thou more lfeamed
than any one of us ? He answered, I offer my profound
obeisance to the most learned, but I must have tire
cattle; and thereupon. Advala took courage to put ques¬
tions to him.
ohti- “Yajfiavalkya, he said, thou knowest how all these
sacrificial elements are pervaded by death and, under
the dominion of death: what shall the sacrificed es-
cape beyond the reach of death withal? He replied:
*“■ He shall escape beyond death by seeing that the Hotji
priest and the voice are one and the same with Agni,
the god invoked by means of them. It is the voice
that is the Hotri priest at the sacrifice, and this same
voice is the fire-god Agiji, and is the Hotyi priest. This-
is the escape, this is the escape beyond death,
“ Yajfiavalkya, he said, thou knowest how all these
sacrificial elements are things that exist in day and
night, and under the dominion of day and night: what
shall the sacrificer escape beyond the reach of day and
night withal? He replied: He shall escape beyond
day and night by seeing that the Adhvaryu priest and
the eye are one and the same with Aditya. It is the
eye that is the Adhvaryu priest at the sacrifice, and
this same eye is the sun-gpd Aditya, and is the Adh¬
varyu priest. {This is the escape, this is the escape
beyond day and night.
" Yaifiavalkya, he said, thou knowest how all these
sacrificial elements are things that exist in the waging
and the waning of the moon, and under the dominion
of the waxing and the waning of the moon: whffb
shall the sacrificer escape beyond the reach of the
waxing and the waning of the moon withal? He-
 OF THE UPA NISHADS. ^57

replied: He shall escape beyond the two semi-lunations Chap, yl

by seeing that the Udgatri priest and tbe vital breath
are one and the same with Yayu. The vital breath is
the U gatri priest at the sacrifice, and this same breath
is the wind-god Yayu, and is the Udgatri priest. This
is the escape, this is the escape beyond the periods of
the waxing and the waning of the moon*
“ YajiLavalkya, he said, thou knowest how yonder
sky seem3 unsupported. By what ascent shall the
sacrificer ascend to the paradise that is his recom¬
pense ? He replied: He shall ascend to paradise by
seeing that the Brahman priest and the inner sense are
one with Chandra. The inner sense is the -Brahman
priest at the sacrifice, and this same inner sense is the
moon-god Chandra, and is the. Brahman priest . This
is the escape, the escape beyond the sky. Such are
the modes of liberation, and the preparations at the
sacrifice/1
ivala’s questions relate to the mystic significance
of the various persons and things employed in the great
sacrifice of Janaka. They are questions in the kind of
knowledge which may be added to the performance of
the time-hallowed ritual; and the ritual, and the know¬
ledge of this kind added to it, may elevate the wor¬
shipper to higher and higher spheres of recompense,
but they are of no avail towards the highest end of
all, the final escape from metempsychosis. The next
interrogator, Artabhaga, proceeds to examine Yajha-
valkya on, the nature of the bondage of the soul, its
implication in metempsychosis. The soul is in bondage
so long as it attributes reality to the objects of its
sensible experience, and the nature of its experience is
determined by the senses and the things of sense.
“ Hext Artabhaga the Jaxatkarava began to question
1dm. YajfLavalkya, he said, how many organs of sense
and motion are there, and how many objects of those
organs? Yajftavalkya replied: There are eight suchpwlwie#'
 *58 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chat, vjl organs and eight such objects. He asked: What are
the eight organs, and what are the eight objects ?
“ YajOavalkya said: Smell is an organ, and the ex¬
haling substance is its object; for a man-is sensible
of odours by the sense of smelL
* The voice is an organ, and the utterable word is its
object; for a man utters words by means of the voice.
“ The tongue is an organ, and the sapid thing isits
object; for a man is sensible of taste by means of the
tongue.
u The eye is an organ, and colour is its object; for a
|aan sees colours with the eye,
** The ear is an organ, and sound is its object; for a
man hears sounds with the ear.
* The common sensory is an organ, and the pleasur¬
able is its object; for a man lusts after the pleasurable
with this sensory.
“ The hands are an organ; and the thing handled is
the object; for a man handles things with the hand ;
“ The skin is an organ, and the tangible is its object;
for a man is sensible of touch by means of the skim
These are the eight organs and, the eight objects of the
organs.
“ Yajfiavalkya, he said, thou knowest how all this
world is food for death, what divine being is death the
food of? Yajft&valkya replied: Fire is the death of
death and fire is the food of water.1 A man may over¬
come death.
Tb*nirt«Qd 4 Yajfiavalkya, he said, when the sage that has won
release from nfetempsychosis dies, do his organs.issue
stdaKth. upwards to pass into another body or not ? Yfyitaval-
kya replied: They do not; they are melted away at the

1 All things in the spheres of the sold, as imperishable, may be

recompense, the world of metemp- disengaged from them, .and may
sychosb, may be destroyed by fee; ceroome death, that is, may
fire itself again maybe destroyed, „ achieve its extrication from me-
that is, extinguished, by water, tempsychosis.
All these things being perishable^
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 159

moment of his death. He is inflated, and swells, and Chap, vl

lies a swollen corpse.
“ YajAavalkya, he said, when the liberated sage dies,
what is it that does not leave him ? The Rishi replied:
His name; his name is endless: the V&vadevas are
endless, and therefore he wins an endless recompense.
“ Yajnavalkya, he said, where does a man that has
not won this release go when he dies, and his voice
passes back into Are and his vital breath into the air,
his eyes into the sun, his common sensory into the
moon, his ears into the regions of space, his body
into the earth, the ether in his heart into the ether
without, the hair of his body into plants, the hair of his
head into trees, and his blood into water ? Yajhavalkya
said: Give me thy band, good Artabhaga; we will find
out the answer to thy question, but this is no matter
to discuss in public! So they went out and conferred
together, and said that it was the law of retribution
that they had been speaking of, and pronounced it to
be this law that sent the soul from body into body. to.
A man becomes holy by holy, works, and unholy by trfbotton.
unholy works in previous lives.
"Hereupon Artabhaga the Jaratkarava held his
peace.”
At the. death of an-ordinary man his several organs
of sense and motion, as forming .part of the tenuous
involuerum of his soul,,pass out and enter into a new
body, and he is bom again. At the death of the perfect
sage they sink back into the original unity of Brahman,,
as .waves sink back into the sea. The answer to the
question. Where does the soul that has not won its
release go after the dissolution of his present body ? is
that it goes into some new embodiment, higher or lower
in the scale according to its works in former. lives. By
the law of retribution the soul becomes holy, that is, is
horn into higher grades, of life, by good works, by con¬
formity to the prescriptive sacra; and it becomes un-
 160 TUB PHILOSOPHY

Chap, vl holy, that is, is bom into vegetal, animal, or otlig* lower
grades of life, by unholy works, that is, by heglec/ of
immemorial usages. The reader must beware of attach¬
ing to the text a higher moral and spiritual significance
than -properly belongs to it
Bhnjyu exa- ** Next Bhujyu, the grandson of Lahya, began tp ques-
thi tion him. Yajnavalkya, he said, when we were itinerat-
ing as sacred students in the country of the Madras, we
*acrifioa’ came to the house of Patanchala the Kapya. He had
a daughter possessed of- a spirit, more than human, a
Gandharva. We asked the Gandharva who he was,
and he said that he was Sudhanvan, an Angirasa; In
talking to him about the uttermost parts of the world,
we asked what had become of the descendants of Bank-
shit. How I ask thee, Yajnavalkya, what has become
of the Parikshitas?
“Yajnavalkya said: They have gone to the sphere
to which they go who have celebrated an A£vamedha.
or sacrifice of a horse. Bhujyu asked: And where do
the celebrants of an ASvamedha go ? This world, said
Yajftavalkya, is equal to thirty-two daily journeys of the
sun-god’s chariot. This is surrounded on every side by
a land of twice that size. That land again is surrounded
by a sea twice as extensive. Beyond this sea there is
an ethereal space of the width of a razor’s edge or a mos-
• quito’s wing. There Indra, taking the shape of a bird,
conveyed the Parikshitas to the air, the air holding the
Parikshitas within itself forwarded them to the sphere
where all former celebrants of an Alvamedha reside.
The Gandharva therefore revealed to you that it was
the air through which the Parikshitas passed. Air is
each and every thing, and air is all things. He that
knows it as such overcomes death.
, “ Hereupon Bhujyu Lah^ayani was silent.
" Next TJshasta Chakrayana began to question him.
Yajftavalkya, be said, tell me plainly what that present
and-visible Brahman is, that is the Self within all living
p
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 161

things ? Yajfiavalkya replied: The Self that is thine is Chap, vl

the Self within all living things. What Self, Yajfca- uahJtT»n*
valkya, is in all things ? Yajnavalkya answered: That
which breathes with the breath is the Self that is thine, S°^Sdtn
and that i« in all living things. That which descends Satt&eseif
with the descending air of life-is the Self that is thine,
and that is in all living things. That which circulates
with the circulating air of life is the Self that is thine,
and that is in all living things. That which ascends
with the ascending air of .life the Self that is thine,
and that is in all living things. This is thy Self that is
in all things that are.
u Ushasta Chakrayana said: Thou hast only taught
me as a man might say a cow is so and so, a horse is.
so and so. Point out to me plainly what that present
and visible Brahman is, that is the Self within all living
things. Yajfiavalkya replied again. The Self that i3
thine is the Self within all living things. Ushasta
asked again, What Self is in all things ? Yajfiavalkya
answered him: I cannot point it out. Thou canst not
see the seer of the sight; thou canst not hear that that
hears the hearing; thou canst not think the thinker of
the thought; thou canst not know the knower of all
knowledge. This is thy Self that is in all things that
are, and everything else is misery.
“ Hereupon Ushasta Chakrayana ceased from farther
questioning.”
So far, says Sankaracharyai the text of this dialogue
has treated of the bondage of the soul, its implication
in metempsychosis, and has taught that the migrating
soul is, if only it be truly viewed, the Self itself. The
text now proceeds to treat of the renunciation of all
things and spiritual intuition, as the means by which
the soul may win its release from further transmigration.
Next Kahola Kaushltakeya began to question him
Yajfiavalkya, he said* tell me plainly what that present
and visible Brahman is, that is the Self within all living
T.
 162 THE PHILOSOPHY

qjut.vl things.. Yajhavalkya said, This Self of thine is the

Self that is -within all things. What Self, Yajhavalkya,
is in all things ? Yajhavalkya answered him: The Self
that is beyond hunger and thirst, and grief- and stupor,
and decay and death. Knowing the Self to be such,
Brahmans have risen and laid aside the desire t>f chil¬
dren, the desire of wealth, and the desire of spheres of
recompense, and have wandered forth as sacred mendi¬
cants. Bor the desire of children is the same as the
desire of wealth, and the desire of wealth is the same
as the desire of the spheres of recompense; for there
are both of these kinds of desire. Therefore1 let a
Brahman learn wisdom, and stand fast in the power of
wisdom; and .having made an end of wisdom and the
power of wisdom, let him become a quietist; and when
he has made an end of quietism and non-quietism, he
n»Tidon*ry shall become a Brahman, a Brahman indeed. What-
mSBrttaSoan.eveT kind of a Brahman he may have been, he becomes
a veritable Brahman now.
“ Hereupon Kahola Kaushltakeya held his peace;.
G&rgl ques¬ “Next GargI the daughter of Yachaknu began to
tions atm.
Over what is question him. Yajhavalkya, she said, thou knowest
the oocmlo
web wo vent how all this earth is woven upon the waters warp and

woof; what are the waters woven upon warp and - woof ?
Upon the air, GargI, replied the RishL What is the
air woven upon warp and woof 1 Upon the regions of
middle space, GargI What are the regions of middle
space woven upon warp and woof ? Upon the spheres
of the Gandharvas, GargI What are the spheres of
the Gandharvas woven upon warp and woof 1 Upon
the solar spheres, GargI What are the solar spheres
woven upon warp and woof ? Upon the lunar spheres,

1The translation of this part as a child; and after renouncing

of the verse follows the gloss of learning and a childlike mind, let
{Wiharftchfrrya. Quitting the tra- him became a quietist; and wuten
djtkmal explanation, the words he has made an end of quietism
might be translated, “Let a BrSh- and non-quietism, he ahall beoome
manrenounoelearximg and become a Brahman, a Brahman indeed.**
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 163

Gar^L What are the lunar spheres woven upoji warp Our. VL
and woof ? Upon the starry spheres, GargL What are
the starry spheres woven upon warp and woof ? Upon
the spnere3 of the gods, GargL What are the spheres
of the gods woven upon warp and woof ? Upon the
spheres of Indra, GargL What are the spheres of Indra
woven upon warp and woof? Upon the spheres of
Prajapsti, GargL What are the spheres of Prajapati
woven npon warp and woof ? Upon the spheres of
Brahma, GargL What are the s heres of Brahma woven
upon warp and woof ? He said to her: GargI, push not
thy questioning too far, lest thy head fall off. Thou
goest' too far in putting questions about the divine
being that transcend such questioning; push not thy
questioning too far:
" Hereupon GargI the daughter of Yaehaknu ceased
to speak*
Here as elsewhere in the Upanishads, the various
spheres of recompense through which the soul has to
. go up aud down in its migrations in obedience to the
law of retribution, are said to he woven warp and woof,
like so jmany veils of finer and finer tissue, across and
across the one and only Self. The whole world of
{semblances is only a vesture that hides from the soul,
the underlying spiritual essence of which it is only
one of the innumerable fictitious, emanations.
Hie soul is one of the countless sparks of the fire,,
one of the countless wavelets of the sea, one of the
countless images of the sun upon the waters; aad is
only the inexplicable power of the illusion tha t
eises itself from before all time, that hides from it its
pure and characterless nature, its unity with the pri¬
mitive essence, thought, and bliss. The true Self is
hidden from the eyes and thoughts of living souls by
veil after veil of illusory presentation, by sphere after
sphere of seeming action and suffering; the successive
figments of the primitive world-fiction, the principle of
 164. THE PHILOSOPHY

Gatt. vx unreality that has unreally associated' itself from before

all aeons with the principle of reality.
So far the various speakers in the dialogue have
talked about the spheres of recompense lower jin ascent
than the sphere of Hiranyagarbha. Beyond Prajapati
or Purusha, heyond the souls in the waking state, is
Hffcanyagarbha, the Sutratman, the spirit that per¬
meates all dreaming souls; and beyond Hiranyagarbha
and the dreaming souls is l£vara, the internal ruler,
the spirit that is present in all souls in their dreamless
sleep, that directs every movement of every living
tking, and metes out to the migrating sentiencies their
varied lots from, the lowest to the highest, in accord¬
ance- with the law of retribution. Accordingly the
dialogue proceeds to treat of the thread-soul Hiranya¬
garbha, and the internal ruler Bvara withiu the thread-
soul.
“ Next Uddalaka the son of Aruna began to question
him. Yajftavalkya, he said, we once lived in the coun-
Madras, in the house of Patanchala the-
**''*»• ’ Kapya, studying the nature and import of .sacrificial
rites. He had a wife possessed of a spirit more'than
human, a Gandharva. ,We asked the Gandharva who
he was, and he said, I am Kabandha the son of Athar-
van. He also said to Patanchala the Kapya, and
to us Iiturgi8t3: Kapya, dost thou know what the
thread is by which this embodiment and the next em¬
bodiment and all*living things are strung together?
Pat ohala the Kapya said, I do not know it, venerable
apr He said again to Patanchala the Kapya, and to
us iturgists: Kapya, dost thou know that which actuates
this embodiment and the next embodiment and all
living things from within? Patanchala the Kapya
said, Great spirit, I know it not. The Gandharva said
again to Patanchala the Kapya, and to us liturgic
students: Kapya,-he that knows that thread and that
internal actuator within the thread-soul, knows Brah-
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 165

man, knows the spheres of recompense, knows the cur.vx

gods, knows the Yedas, knows 'all living things, knows
the Self, knows all things. He revealed the thread*
soul and the internal actuator that is within it to us,
and I know them. Now if thou, Yajfiavalkya, hast
driven away the cattle that are the prize of the most
learned Brahman, without knowing that thread-soul.
. and that internal ruler, thy head shall fall off. Yajha-
valkya said, Gautama, I know that thread-soul and
that internal ruler. Uddalaka rejoined, Any one can
say, l know them; tell me what thou knowest.
k‘ Yajfiavalkya said: Gautama, the air is that thread-
soul. This embodiment and the next embodiment and
all living things are strung together by the air. It is
for this reason-that they say of a dead man that his
.limbs are unstrung, for his limbs are strung together
by the air as by a thread. Just so, Yajfiavalkya, said
Uddalaka; now tell me about the internal actuator.”
Sankaracharya tells us that the air is here a me- He quMttaoi;
tonym for the supersensible rudiments, or elements in.^^^dUM
their primitive state, as yet uncondensed by progres- Twh?4S£”
sive concretion.. It is out of these supersensible ele¬
ments that the tenuous involwra, or invisible .bodies of
migrating souls, are formed. These invisible bodies
clothe the soul in its transit from body to body, and
the retrib tive influences of the good and evil works
of former ves adhere to them. Yajfiavalkya proceeds
to answer Uddalaka by a description of the Demiurgus,
the universal soul that permeates and vivifies all
nature and all migrating personalities. This cosmic
soul is the first manifestation of Brahman; it is Brah¬
man itself in its first illusory presentment, is ficti¬
tiously overspread with Maya, or, as it is otherwise
said, with the whole world-fiction as a body, the cosmic
uody out of which all things lifeless and living eman¬
ate. It is in virtue of the presence and light of this
universal soul within them that the deities of earth’.
 166 THE. PHILOSOPHY

Ch-u*. vl and water, and fire, and other natural agents, pass
from rest to motion and from motion to rest again.
This universal soul is also present in every living
thing, from the grass below the feet to Brahma tne god
high over all; and it is in virtue of his presence and
his light that they pass from rest to motion, arid from
motion back to rest. He is invisible, and vision is his
being; unknowable, and knowledge is his being;'as
heat and light are the being of fire. As the universal
soul he is exempt from the varied experiences of me¬
tempsychosis, which are the modes of individual life,
and which he allots, in conformity always with the
law of retribution, to the innumerable migrating souls.
theDeminr- *Yajftavalkya said: That which dwells in earth,
tontal ruler or inside the earth, and earth knows not, whose body the

4nt«nd Wie earth, is, which actuates the earth from within,—that

is thy Self, the internal ruler, immortal.

awL “ That which dwells in water, inside the water, and
SeeSmaiu! the water knows not, whose body the water is, which
actuates the water from within,—that is thy Self, the
internal ruler, immortal,
“ That which dwells in fire, inside the fire, and the
fire knows not, whose body the fire is, which actuates
the fire from within,—that is thy Self, the internal ruler,,
immortal.
“ That which dwells in air, inside the air, and the
air knows not, whose body the air is, which actnates
the air from within,—that is thy Self, the internal
ruler, immortal
“ That which dwells in wind, inside the wind, and
the wind knows not, whose body the wind is, which
actuates the wind from within,—that is thy Self, the
internal ruler, immortal.
“ That which dwells in the sky, inside the sky, and
the sky knows not, whose body the sky is, whicn
actnates the sky from within,—that is thy Self, the
internal ruler, immortal
 OP THE UPANISHADS. *6?

That 'which dwells in the sun, inside the sun, and cfiur. vi.
the son knows not, whose body the sun is, which '
actuates the sun from within,—that is thy Self, the
internal ruler, immortal.
“ That which dwells in the regions of space, inside
the regions, and the regions know not, whose body the
regions are, which actuates the regions from within,—
that is thy Self, the internal ruler, immortal.
“ That which dwells in the moon and stars, inside
the moon and stars, and the moon and stars know not,
whose body the moon and stars are, which actuates the
moon and stars from within,—that is thy Self, the
internal ruler, immortal.
“ That which dwells in the ether, inside the ether,
which the ether knows not, whose body the ether is,
which actuates the ether from within,—that is thy
Self, the internal ruler, immortal
“That which dwells in darkness, inside the darkness,
which the darkness knows not, whose body the dark¬
ness is, which actuates the darkness from within,—
that is thy Self, the internal ruler, immortal.
“ That which dwells in light, inside the light, which
the light knows not, whose body the light is, which
actuates the light from within,—-that is thy Self, the
internal ruler, immortal
“Such are the elemental manifestations of the internal
ruler; now for his manifestations in animated nature.
“That which dwells in all living things, inside all Hainfom*
living things, which no thing living knows, whose body miMa*
all living things are, which actuates all things living tW"e*'
from within,—that is thy Self, the internal ruler, im¬
mortal
“That which dwells in the breath of life, infcide the
breath, which the breath knows not, whose body the
breath is, which actuates the breath from within,—that
is thy Self, the internal ruler, immortal
“ That which dwells in the voice, inside the voice,
 168 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. VL which the voice knows not, whose body the voice-is,
which actuates the voice from within,—that is thy
Self, the internal ruler, immortal.
“ That which dwells in the eye, inside the eye, which
the eye knows not,, whose body the eye is, which
actuates the eye from within,—that is thy Self, the
internal'ruler, immortal
u That which dwells in the ear, inside the ear, which
the ear knows not, whose body the ear is, which
actuates the ear from within,—that is thy Self,' the
internal ruler, immortal
“ -That which dwells in the inner sense, inside tho
inner sense, which the inner sense knows not, whose
body the inner sense, is, which actuates the inner sense
from within, — that is thy Self, the internal ruler,
immortal
“That which dwells in the sense of touch, inside the
touch, which the touch knows not, whose hody the
sense of touch is, which actuates the sense of touch
from within, — that is thy Self, the internal ruler,
immortal
“ That which dwells in the consciousness, inside the
consciousness, which the consciousness knows not,
whose body the consciousness is, which actuates the
consciousness from within,—that is thy Self, the inter¬
nal ruler, itiimortaL
Jo*. “That which sees unseen, hears unheard, thinks
unthought upon, knows unknown; that other than
tom, which there is none that sees, none that hears, none
that thinks, none that knows:—that is thy Self, the
internal ruler, immortal Everything else is misery.
** Hereupon Uddalaka the son of Aruna ceased from
questioning.”
From Brahman as manifested in the form of the
Demiurgus or universal soul that permeates and ani¬
mates all things, the dialogue next passes to Brahman
as beyond manifestation, the present aud visible Brah-
 OF THE VPAN1SHADS. 169

m within the heart of every living thing the pure vl Chap.

light, the characterless fontal essence.

“ Next GargI the daughter of Yachaknu spoke again: eagrct*
Reverend Brahmans, I will ask this man two questions.
If he can answer them, no one of you all can outvie the mb of the
him in exposition of the Sell They said, Ask him, £“1^caon
GargI
“'Yajhavalkya, said GargI, I rise to put two ques¬
tions to thee. I rise as some 'Raja of Ka£i or Videha
might rise to encounter thee, a father of heroes, with
his how strung, and with two sharp threatening arrows
of cane in his hand. Answer me these questions.
Yajhavalkya said. Put the questions to me.
* Yajhavalkya, she said, across what is that principle
woven warp and woof, which they say is above the sky,
below the ea^th, and within which this earth and yonder
sky exist, and all that has been, is, and is to be ?
“ Yajhavalkya said: That principle that they say is
above the sky, below the earth, and within which this
earth and yonder sky exist, and all that has been, is,
and is to be,—is woven warp and .woof across and
across the ethereal expanse.1
“ GargI said: Glory to thee, Yaj&avalkya, that thou
hast answered this my first question; now prepare
thyself to meet the second. He said. Put it to me.
GargI
“ She said: Yajhavalkya, across what is that principle
woven warp and woof, which they say is above the sky,
below the earth, and within which this earth and
yqnder sky exist, and all that has been, is, and is
to be?
“ Yajhavalkya answered her again: That principle .
that they say is above the sky, below the earth, and
within which this earth and yonder sky exist, and all
that has been, is, and is to be,—is woven warp and
woof, across and across the ethereal expanse. And I
1 Ethereal expanse Is here a synonym of M&ya.
 170 THE PHILOSOPHY

chap, vl pray, said she, across what is the ethereal express

woven warp and woof ?
it is wren “ Yajhavalkya said: Brahmans say that that across
theprindpie which the ethereal expanse is woven is the imperish-
tty a-ble principle, neither great nor small, neither long nor
to this moving neither glowing like fire nor fluid like water,
shadowless, without darkness, neither aerial nor ethereal,
without contact with anything, colourless, odourless,
without eyes or ears or voice or inward sense, without
light from without, without breath or mouth. It has
no measure; it has nothing within it or without it. It
consumes nothing, and is consumed of none.
“ Under the dominion of this imperishable principle,
GargI, the sun and moon stand fixed in their places;
under the governance of this imperishable principle the
earth and sky stand fixed in their places.
“ Under the dominion of this imperishable principle,
GargI, the moments and hours, and days and nights,
and fortnights and months, and seasons and years;
stand fixed in their periods; under the governance of
this imperishable principle, GargI, some of the rivers
flow eastward from the snowy mountains, some west¬
ward, and others in other directions.
“ Under the dominion of this imperishable principle
men praise those that give freely; the gods are depend¬
ent on the sacrifices, and the ancestral spirits upon the
obsequial offerings.
‘ It a man presents oblations and sacrifices or tortures'
himself for many thousand years in this life, and knows
not this imperishable principle, his recompense is one
that has an end. If, GargI, a man quits this life
without knowing this imperishable principle, he is
helpless; but if he knows this principle he is indeed a
Brahman.
“This same imperishable principle, GargI, i3 tnat
which sees unseen, hears unheard, thinks unthonght-
upor knows unknown; there is no other than this that
 OF THE UPAN1SHADS. 171

seen no other than this that hears, no other than this Chap, vl

that thinks, no other than this that knows. It is across

this imperishable principle, Gargl, that the ethereal
expanse is woven warp and woof.
“ Then Gargl exclaimed: Venerable Brahmans, you
may think it a great matter if you can save yourselves
by making obeisance to this Rishi. Never will any
one of you all outvie this Rishi in the exposition of the
Self/*
In the words of Sankaracharya, the Self is unseen. The seif»
inasmuch as it cannot be made an object, but it is that SbSSriew
which sees, inasmuch as it is a pure and unceasing act
of vision itself. Elsewhere1 he tells us that the Self is
the object of the notion and the name “I” It cannot
be heard, but it is that which hears, being a pure and
unceasing act of hearing. It cannot be thought upon,
but it is that which thinks, being a pure and unceasing
act of thought. It cannot l j known, but it is that
which knows, being itself the pure and unceasing act
of knowledge. It sees with a sight that does not come
and pass away, like our sight, but with a sight that
always is, a sight that.is its being, as the sun shines for
ever with a light that is its own being. It is the Self
that sees through, the eyes, hears through the ears,
thinks through the thought, knows through the mind,
of all living things. This is the present and visible
Brahman, present in the heart of every creature, visible
to the purified soul of the ecstatic seer. This is the
Self that seems and only seems to act and suffer in the
acting and suffering souls, as the moon seems to move
as the clouds scud past it This is the one and only
Self beyond the hunger, thirst, and misery of metemp¬
sychosis, and over this the world-fiction ,and all the
figments that issue out of it are woven warp and woof.
This is the goal, the final term. This, ever-present
1 Am in the ferlrakanumttosabhashya, 1 l.i, and the Vivekachadamani,
veree 127.
 tji- THE PHILOSOPHY

fyur. YL though it he, it is veiled from the hearts and eyes of the'
' multitude, and reveals itself only to the spiritual vision
of the perfect sage. He alone can find himself one
-with the universal soul, and one with the impersonal
Self.
The dialogue now proceeds to point out how the gods.
are all of them only local and particular manifestations
of the one life that lives in all things. It is one land
the same divine being that fictitiously presents itself
in every living being, to. fulfil a variety of functions
under all the variety of na* ' and form and attribute
- and ppwer.
vkhgdfaft “ Next Vidagdha the soil of &akala began to question
him. Yajftavalkya, he said, how many gods are there ?
JnSSxSm Yajftavalkya answered him according to the following
ZSjSSL Nivid or enumerative text. There are, he $iid, as many
aSaf®***1* as are enumerated in the Nivid of the Yahfradeva&stia;.
three and three hundred, and three and three thonward;
Even so, said Yidagdha; how many gods are there then,
Yajftavalkya? Three and thirty, replied the Rishi;
Even so, said .Yidagdha; how -many gods are there'
then, Yajftavalkya ? Six, he replied. Even so, said
Yidagdha ; and again, how many gods are there then;
Yajftavalkya? Three, he said. Yes, said Yidagdha; and
how many gods are there then, Yajftavalkya ? Two, he '
said. Yes, said Yidagdha; and again, how many gods
are‘there, Yajftavalkfa ? One and a half, he said. Yes,
said Yidagdha; how. many gods'are there, Yajftavalkya ?
One, he answered. Yea, said Yidagdha; and what are.
those three gods and three hundred gods, and those
three gods and three thousand gods ?
“Yajftavalkya said: The glories of these are.three
and thirty. Which are those thirty-three ? asked the
son of ^akala. The eight Yasus, replied the Rishi, the
eleven Rudras, and the twelve Adityas are thirty-one,
and Indra and Prajapati make, thirty-three.
* Who are the Yasns ? Eire, the earth, the air, the
 OF THE UPAN1SHADS. r73

welkin, bhe sun, the sky, the moon, end the stars, are chap, yi
the Vasus. In these all places of recompense are con- J—
tained, and therefore they are called the Yasus.
"Who arc the Eudras? These ten organs of sense
.and motion in the living soul, together with the com¬
mon sensory which is the eleventh organ. When
they issue upwards out of this mortal body they make
mea weep, and for this reason. thev are called the
Eudras.
“ Who are the Adityas ? The twelve months of the
year are the Adityas, for these take all things .together
with them in their course; and for the reason thatthey
take all things with them they are called the Adityas.'
“ Who is Indra, and who is Prajapati ? Indra is the
thunder,,and Prajapati is the sacrifice. What is the
thunder? The thunderbolt. What is the sacrificet
The sacrificial victims..
“Who are the six gods? They are fire, earth, air,
welKin, sun, and sky. They are six; for all things are
these six.
“Who are the three gods? They are these three
worlds, earth, air, and sky.; for all these gods are in
these three. Who are the two gods ? They are food
fend vital air, or Purusha and Hiranyagai/bha. Who
is the god that is one and a half ? ‘The wind that
blows.
“ Hereupon they cried out: This wind that is blowing
seems to be one, how. saypst thou that it is one and
a half? Yajfiavalkya replied: It is one and a half
(adhyardhd.) because everything grows up (adhyardh-
noti) in it. Who is the one god? asked Yidagdha.
Yajhavalkya said: It is the breath of life. It is the
Sell. They call it That.
“He who knows that Purusha, that living being;
. whose body is the earth, whose eye is fire, whose inward
sense is light, in whom all are one who live in the body;
he indeed has knowledge. Yajhavalkya, said the son
 m ' THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. vi. of fSakala, I know that Purusha, in whom all that live
in the body are one, about whom thou speakest: it is
this veiy living soul that is in the body. Tell me then,
son of Sakala, said the Rishi, what is the* divinity1 of
that embodied soul ? It is the assimilated portion of
food, said Yidagdha.”
Yidagdha puts question after question to Yajftaval-
kya, till the Rishi again proclaims that all things in the
world, and the ethereal expanse, or world-fiction, out of
which they proceed, are woven web upon web across
the one underlying reality, the spiritual essence. Brah¬
man.
" This Self is not this, not that: imperceptible, for it

cannot be perceived; indiscerptible, for it cannot be

parted asunder; illimitable, for nothing can be placed
beside it; inviolable, for it cannot be kur£ or injured
vidagdha Now I ask thee what is that Purusha, that spiritual
in tum and essence, revealed in the mystic doctrines, that trans¬
cends those other Purushas or embodied souls; aild if
thou canst not tell me, thy head shall fall off. The son
of Sakaja did not know that Purusha, so his head fell
off; and as his disciples were carrying home his bones
to bum them on the funeral pyre, thieves stole them,
taking them to he some other thing.
* Meanwhile Yajfiavalkya said: Holy Brahmans, any
one of you who wishes may question me, or you may
all of you put questions to me; or I will put questions
to any one of you that you may choose, or to all of you.
But the Brahmans had no heart to answer him.
“So Yajnavalkya put a question to them in these
ffftfwwt-trw! verses. Man, he said, is indeed like a tree of the forest;
dowriwhat his hair is the leaves, his skin the outer bark. The
mwagablood trickles from his skin, as the sap trickles from'the
TOml bark; wound him, and the blood will flow like sap from
a tree that is split open. His flesh is the inner bark,
1 Divinity here means inform- says that the body is built up out
ing or plastic principle. Vidagdha of materials assimilated from food.
 OP THE VPANISHADS. 175

the flesh about his bones is the membrane about the ceup. yl
woody fibres, his bones are the wood within, and his
marrow is the pith. The tree is cut down, and the tree
grows p anew from its root; a mortal i3 cut down by
death, bu what root has he to grow up from anew?
Say not from procreation, for that comes not from the
dead but from the living. The seed-sprung tree that
has^ seemed to die springs up again apace, but if they
tear up the tree by the roots it cannot grow again.
Man is cut down by death, what root has he to grow
again from? You may say that he is already born
again, but this not so; who then can again beget
him?”
The Brahmans were unable to answer Yajnavalkya,
not knowing that the soul, as it passes from body to
body, has one continuous life, as being one with, and
only in fictitious semblance severed from, the one and
only Self that is the root of the world. After thus
putting his successive opponents to silence, and over¬
awing the whole assembly, the Rishi remains in undis¬
puted possession of the prize, the thousand head of
cattle. He sums up the whole matter in the following
words, which close the discussion:—
•"The Self is thought and bliss, the wealth of the The sum of the
sacrifice, the final goal of the sage that knows it, and
perseveres in ecstatic union with it.” is the goat
In the next book of the Brihadaranyaka IJpanishad
we have an account of two later interviews between
the Rishi Yajhavalkya and the Raja Janaka. Princes
are frequently mentioned in the Upanishads as taking
a leading part in theosophic discussions.
“Janaka of Yideha was sitting giving audience, and
Yajftavalkya came before him. He said: Yajhavalkya, Their ooSJc£
/ , , J £ n i aatfoxL The '
what have you come for ? Do you want more cattle, passage
o* do you want subtle disputations ? He said: I want
both, great king.”
Yajhavalkya proceeds to question Janaka about the ***’
 l76 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap, vx instruction he has received, from his various 'spiritual

' directors, and points out how each of them has only
taught him about the Self in some one or other of its
local and particular manifestations, a knowledge of
which leads only to transitory recompense, not to
extrication, from metempsychosis.
“ Then Janaka of Videha' came down from his seat
• and said: GloTy to thee, Yajhavalkya; teach me more..
The Rishi said: Great king, thou art thoroughly
equipped with these mystic instructions that thou hast
received, as is a man who has provided himself with a
carriage or a boat, being about to start on a long jour¬
ney. Great and rich, versed in the Vedas and informed
of mystic doctrines as thou art, when thou qiuttest this
life whither wilt thou go? I do not know, said Janaka,
. where I shall go. Then I will tell thee where thou wilt
go, said the Rishi. Say on, holy sir, replied the prince.
"This Parasha that is in the right eye is named
Indha, but for the sake of mystery men call him Indra:
for the gods love mystery and hate familiarity.
“ifhe Purusha in the left eye is his wife Viraj.
Their meeting-place is the ether in the heart, their
nourishment is the blood within the heart, their coverlet
is the network of arteries in the heart, their path of
transit is the artery that goes upward out of the heart;
The arteries, minute as a hair split a thousand times,
converge into the heart, and the food proceeds along
these; so that the tenuous involucrum has a more refined
kind of nutriment than the body.
“ When the sage has passed through the body to the'
tenuous involucrum, and through the tenuous* involu¬
crum to the beatific vesture iu the heart, the forward
vital air is the eastern quarter, the vital air to therleft
is the south, the hinder vital air is the west, the upward
vital air-is the north, the upper vital air is the spa e
above, the nether vital air is the space below.. The
vital airs are the regions of space.”
 - OF THE UPANISHADS. 177

In the^beatific vesture and in. the state of dreamless cur. vt

sleep the sage returns to unity with the vital air, that
is, with the -universal souL In the. state of ecstasy
he indices this universal.-soul' to disappear into the
ptinrap.tArte.8g Self, of which Yajnavalkya .proceeds to
speak:
“ This gaiun Self is not this, not that; imperceptible,
fornt cannot he perceived; indisOerptible, for it canno
he parted asunder; illimitable, for' nothing, can he plaoed
beside it; inviolable, for it cannot be hurt or injured.
O Janaka, thou hast reached ..the point where there is
nq more fear. Janaka of Yideha said: 'May this salva¬
tion come to thee also, Yajnavalkya, for leaching me
ahoijt this spiritual reality that is beyond all . fear.
Glory to thee: here is this kingdom of Yideha, and
here am I, and both are thine.”
The text, 0 Janaka,1 thou hast reached the point
where* there is no more fear, is One of those most fre¬
quently quoted in the works of the Indian schoolmen.
The" point beyond aU feat is the pure spiritual essence;-
Brahman, on reaching which there is no further fear of
birth and the miseries of life .and death. The ^tishi
has lifted the veil of illusion, and thus enabled Janaka
to see the sole reality, the one and only Self, and to
recognise, and by recognition. recover, his own unity
with it. The story of Yajiavalkya’s next , interview
with Janaka is as follows.:—
“ YajAavalkya went again before Janaka, the Eaja
of Videha, and thought as he went that this time he •gjg-JBj**
would not say anything. Janaka of Yideha and Y^jha- jSSSaeto.
Yalkya had, however, formerly talked together-at a-
sacrifice to the fire-god Agni, and Yiijfiavalkya had
promised Janaka to grant the next request that he.
might have to make of him. Janska .now chose as his
. qtiest permission to ask' any quOstion he liked, and
Yajnavalkya granted it. The’ Baja first asked him:—
1 A%hayam vai Jdndka pr&pto *$L
 i”8 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chat.vi. “Yajiiavalkya, what light has man? The light of

the sun, great king, said the Rishi. It is by the light
of the sun that he sits down, or goes about and does his
work, and comes home again. The Raja'said: It is as
thou sayest, Yajiiavalkya.
“ But when the sun has set, Yajiiavalkya, what light
has man i The. light of the moofa, the Rishi answered.
It is in the light of the moon that he sits down, or goes
about and does what he has to do, and comes home
again. It is as thou sayest, Yajiiavalkya, said the Raja.
“ But, Yajiiavalkya, when the sun has set and the
moon has set, what light has man ? A fir.e, he an¬
swered, is his light. -It is by the light of a fire that he
sits down, or goes about and does what he has to do,
and comes home again. The Raja said: “ It is as thout
sayest, Yajiiavalkya.
“ But, Yajiiavalkya, when the sun has set, and the
moon has set, and the fire has gone out, what light has
man? The voice,1 he answered, is his light: it is by
the light of the voice that he sits down, or goes about
and does what he has to do, and comes home again;
for when a man cannot see his hand before him, he
walks in the direction that a voice is heard in. The
Raja said: It is as thou sayest, Yajhavalkya.
“But, Yajhavalkya, when sun and moon are set, and
the fire is out, and all sounds are hushed, what light
has man? He answered: The Self within him is his
light: it is by the light of the Self that he sits down
or goes about, does what he has to do, and comes home
again.”
In explanation of this last verse, iWkaracharya says:
“ In every state the mind has some light to act in, a light
that is other than the body and the senses. Ill the

i “ In. a. cloudy night in the he hears about him, or it may be

rainy season a man cannot see his by the barking of a dog, the bray-
hand before him. He is guided ing of an ass, or other signs of
in his movements by the voioes village life.”—SanJcaracharycL
 ' OF THE UPANISHADS. .%79

making" state it acts through the bodily organs in the Chap. yi.
light of sun, or moon, or fire. In the dreaming state, —
in the state of dreamless sleep, and in the waking state,
whem there is neither sun nor moon nor firelight to
guide it In its actions, it still continues to act, and does
so in- some light that is incorporeal and immaterial.
In dreaming a man* sees himself meeting with or part¬
ing from his friends, and on waking from sleep without
a dream he still is conscious that he has slept in peace
and without a cognisance of anything. This immaterial
light* is the light of the Self, which is other than the
body and the senses, and illumines them like the ex¬
terior light, and itself requires* no light’ from outside
itself. This is the light within.” To .return to the
text.-
“ What Self is that ? asked the prince. The Rishi The true light
said: It is this conscious soul amidst the vital airs, the
light within the heart. This Self, one and the same in heart*
every mind and every body, passes through this life
and the next life in the body, and seems to think and,
seems to move. The same Self, entering the dreaming
state, passes beyond the world of waking experience,
beyond the varied forms of metempsychosis.
“ This self-same Self is bom, and as it enters into a
body is involved in the good and evil deeds that attach
to the members and the senses; it passes up at death
out of the body, and leaves them behind.
“ This same Self has two stations: any given present
embodiment, and the embodiment that is next to fol- migrating
low. 4-ad there is a third place: the state intermediate
between the two—the place of dreams. Standing in £5^
the place of dreams, it sees both these stations, this
embodiment and the embodiment next to come. In
the place of dreams it steps on to the path it has made
itself to the next embodiment, and sees the pains and
pleasures that have been in earlier lives and are to be
in after-lives. When it proceeds-to dream, it takes to
 x8o THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap, vl itself the ideal residues of its waking experience

former lives; it lays aside the body; it fashions for
in sleep'the itself an ideal body, and dreams in* its own light, and
dreani-woild. then the Self is its own light. In the dreaming state
there -are no chariots, no horses, no roads; but it pre¬
sents to itself chariots, horses, and' roads. Th€re are
in that state no pleasures, no joys, no raptures; but it
creates for itself pleasures, joys, and raptures. There
are no houses, no pools, no rivers; but it projects
before itself houses, pools, and. rivers, for it is still in
action.
* Therefore there are these verses. In sleep it lays
aside the body, and itself unsleeping looks upon the
visions of .its sleep. It takes its radiant imagery with
it, and again enters the place of waking experience, for
it is the luminous Self, the one spirit that is ever pass¬
ing onward.
* Keeping alive with the vital air its vile nest the
body, it soars beyond its nest; it goes where it lists,
the immortal, luminous Self, the one spirit that is ever
passing onward.
* "In the place of dreams1 it passes upward, passe*
downward, in its own light: it projects a variety of
shapes before itself, dallying with women, laughing*
or it may be seeing perils.
"Men see the garden*"that it strolls in, but no man
sees the Self itself. They say they cannot rouse it
when it is asleep.
“Rat part of the hbdy to which this does not come
back again is hard to heal; it is blind, or deaf, and
lifeless. Some, indeed, say that the place of dreams is
not a* intermediate position, but the same as the place
of waking experience, because it sees the same things
*In it* dreams the soul rises to tidpation of a future one, highfv
the position of a god, or descends or lower, as it may be, than itr
to the state of one of the lower ani- present human embodiment,
mah. Tbit it does in reminiscence * The dream-world,
uta former embodiment, or in an*
 OF THE UPANISHADS, 181

its dreams as it sees when awake; but this is not so. obaf. vt
In dreaming, the Self is its own light. Janaka ex-
claimed: Holy sir,.I will give thee' a thousand kine.
Teach me again, that I may be liberated from metem¬
psychosis,
“ Yajhavalkya said.: ,This same Self, after rejoicing
and'expatiating in its dreams, and seeing good and evil,
pisses into the peaceful state of dreamless sleep; and
thence again flits back into the place of dreams it came
from,, back to other dreams. It is not followed by the
good or evil that it sees itself do in its dreams, for the
Self is not really in union with the' bodily organs. It
is a3 thou sayest, Yajfiavalkya, said the prince. Holy
sir, I give thee a thousand Vine. Teach me again, that
I may be liberated.
‘ “ Yajfiav Ikya saidt This same Self, after rejoicing
and expatiating in the waking state, and seeing good
and evil, flits again into the place of dreams.
' •“ fhia Self passes from dreams to waking life, and simile of tu
from waking life back to dreams; in the same way as a ^
fish swims from one bank of a river to the other, from
riverside to riverside.
"This Self passes into the state of dreamless sleep, amo*of u»
and in that state desires no pleasures and sees no dreams;<WMO'
in the same way as a kite or falcon, tired of flying about .
in,the firmament above, folds its winars ..and cowers in.
its nest.
"There are in man arteries' thin as a hair split a
thousand times, filled with fluids white, blue, yellow,
green, and red”
These ramify in all directions through the body, the
tenuous involucrum is lodged in them, and the 'ideal
iresidues of the experiences of former embodiments
adhere to the tenuous involucrum, and accompany it in
its passage from body to body. These ideal residues
famish the imagery of dreams,/ and dreams point .back
to the former lives of the soul, or forward to its future
 i8a THE PHILOSOPHY

Can, n. lives. The tenuous involucrum is the body of the sleep

mg soul.
“Now whatever peril a man sees when he is awake,
he may also see in his sleep. Enemies kill fun} or take
him captive, or a wild elephant chases him, and he
falls into a pit.
“ Whatever peril he sees awake, he sees asleep through
the force of illusion; but when, in the same way as *n
his dreams he had seemed to be a god or a king, he
comes to know that he is all that is,—this is his highest
position.
Liberation it “ This intuition of his oneness with all that is, is his
state of exemption from desire, and freedom from the
*ufc»r. S00^ ev^ that prolong the migration of the soul;
his state in which there is no more fear. The soul in
the bosom of the Self is conscious of nothi g within or
without him, even as a man in the arms of his beloved
wife ceases to be conscious of anything within him or
without him. This oneness with all that is, is the state
of the fulfilment of all desires, the state of satisfaction
in oneself and of exemption from desires, the state in
which there is no more sorrow.
mdfffaraum “ In this state a'father is no more a father, a mother
3*&$?..is no more a mother, the spheres of recompense are no
fewKwafthe jonger 0f recompense, the gods no longer gods,
the Yedas no logger Yedas. Here the thief is a thief'
no more, the Chandala a Chandala no more, the Paul-
kasa no-more a Paulkasa, the holy mendicant no more
a holy mendicant, the anchorite an anchorite no more.
He is no longer followed by his good works, no longer
followed by his evil works; for now at length he has
passed beyond all the sorrows of his heart.”
 OF THE VPA NISHA DS.
'*3

CHAPTER VII.

THE SENSATIONAL NIHILISM OF THE BUDDHISTS-

THE COSMOLOGY OF THE SANKHYAS.

** Suppose yourselves gazing on a gorgeous sunset. The whole western

heavens are glowing with roseate hues. But you are aware that in
half-an-hour all the glorious tintd will have faded away into a dull
ashen grey* You see them even now melting away before your eyes,
although your eyes cannot place before you the conclusion that your
reason draws. And what conclusion is that ? That conclusion is that
you never, even for the shortest time that can be named or conceived,
see any abiding colour, any colour which truly is. Within the millionth
part of a second the whole glory of the painted heavens has undergone
an Incalculable series of mutations. Before any one colour has- had
time to be that* colour, it has melted into another colour, and that other
colour has in like manner melted into a third, before it has attained
to any degree of fixedness or duration. The eye indeed seems to
arrest the fieeting pageant, and to give it some continuance. But the
senses, says Heraclitus, are very indifferent witnesses of the truth.
Reason refuses to lay an arrestment on any period of the passing scene,
or to declare that it is, because in the very act of being it 1b not; it
'has given place to something else. It is a seties of fleeting colours, no
one of which w, because each of them continually vanishes in another.”—
Ferrier.

So far the primitive thesis of Indian philosophy has chat. vh.

been presented tp the reader; it is time,to present the The
primitive antithesis, and also the new position taken
up by a later school of Indian thinkers with the purpose **
of superseding this antithesis, and of gaining a firmer
footing by means of a cosmology approaching more
nearly the convictions that work unrecognised in the
popular mind. As has been said already, in the absence
Of historical data, the only methodical exposition of
early Indian philosophy that is possible, must be the
presentation of theses and antitheses that in their
succession made up its process.
 •184 THE PHILOSOPHY

Ohxt. TTL The primitive thesis, the original Indian cosihologiwti

conception, is that of the fictitious nature of the world,
and of the various forms of life that migrate through
it in body after- body, in age after age, and of the
sole reality of- the one impersonal Self. The primitive
antithesis is that there is no such impersonal' Self, nor
spiritual reality underlying the world of passing sem¬
blances. Sensations and the ideal residues of sensations
are the only things that are; and these are only sem¬
blances or fleeting shows, that come out of* and pass
back into a fontal nullity, void, or blank. The things
of sense are fictitious presentments, but not fictions that
replace at the same time that they conceal, a reality
beneath: the mirage of life is an aerial vision that
covers no expanse, unless it :be an expanse of nothing¬
ness. The things of sense^ are only sensations variously
assorted, rising' and passing away at every moment
like the shifting colours of a sunset, cloud!1 All things
are in unceasing flow, and the soul itself is. only a Series
of sensations and ideal residues of sensations. There'
is no inner light, no perduring Self within; the sensa¬
tions jmd ideas flit by lit up with their own light, and
each several stream of these is a migrating soul. The
soul in every successive life has nothing but misery to
look forward to; and the highest end of aspiration is a
lapse into , the;void, a return to the primeval nothing¬
ness, a final .extinction. In the philosophy of the
Upanishads, the mind of the perfect sage is said to be .
blown out like a lamp as he returns to union with the
one and only Self. In. the philosophy of the Indian
sensational nihilists, the successive mental modes are
the mind, and the mind is the only soul. This mind
or soul is extinguished as the sage returns to the
aboriginal nothingness of things. . The liberation
promised in the IJpanishads is a return to the pure
* TCJiii simile occurs iu the second chapter of Msdhav&chfteya’s Serve*
derMOMsagi^he, to which the seeder may refer for further, details.
 OF THE VPANISHADS. i*5

f ate of the soul as characterless being, thought, and chap, til

blessedness. The liberation promised by the Indian

nihilist is a return to the void beyond the miseries of
the phantaemagory of metempsychosis. It is Nirvana,
extinction, return into the fontal nullity. All things
have come out of nonentity, and shall pass back into
nonentity; and as soon as it has fully learnt its un¬
reality, the soul shall pass back into the primordial
nothingness.
This doctrine of the emanation of migrating souls The doetHne
and the spheres of recompense out of an original non- tton </£•""
entity, is as old as the TTpanishads, and appears in a ISSgfaT*11
text of the sixth lecture of the Chhandogya Upani-
shad: “Existent only, my son, was this in the begin-
ning, one'only, without duality, gome indeed have“e^cS»
said. Non-existent only was this in the beginning, one
only, without duality, and the existent proceeded out
of the iton-existent. But how should this be.so ? how
should entity-emanate out of nonentity? This then
was-existent'only in the beginning,, one only, without
duality.”
Tliis passage refers either to philosophical forerunners
of the Buddhists, or to the Buddhists themselves. It
is easy to see how the teaching of the primitive Brah-
manical philosophers would at once provoke opposition.
In the earliest and the rudest age, as in the latest and
richest in hereditary culture, there will always he
people that fail to see the necessity of finding a posi¬
tive reality at the root of things, and mistake a shallow
wit for a deeper wisdom; to whom the light within is a
piece of transcendental moonshine. These primitive The bumm**
Indian sensationalists have so far the advantage over taMbI>v’
thi sensationalists of the present day, that they do not
tacitly substantial: se their sensations, or invent such
trange abstractions as a background of permanent
possibilities of sensations, to replace the realities they
seek to explode. In this Indian proclamation of ai^
 186 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap, vtl aboriginal vacuum or blank, which either already wasr

Tnew or afterwards became Buddhism, the inner light, the
impersonal Self or Brahman, is replaced by zero. The
i»»era. pessimism, metempsychosis, Jand Maya, AvidyS) the
primitive world-fiction, are retained. There is the.
same dread of every future state of life, and the'"same
teaching that inertion, not exertion, is the path of
extrication; and that the sage must loose himself from
every tie, turn his back upon the world, and make all
things disappear by a prolonged effort of abstraction,
by a rigid and insensible posture of body, and by
apathy and vacuity of mind. The phantasmagory of
metempsychosis is a series of sensations and ideas,
reproducing each other like plant and seed and seed
and plant The successive scenes present themselves
that the migrating souls may find the recompense of
theit good and evil works; in higher and l6Wer embodi¬
ments through aeon after aeon, in conformity with the
law of retribution. The migrating souls are themselves
as unreal as the spheres through which they pass. The
soul1 is identified with the mind* of the Brahmanical
philosophers; and the. mind is said to exhibit itself
illusively in the twofold aspect of subject apd object of
consciousness. The process of things is thus pictured
as so many series of sensations variously grouped, pre¬
senting themselves to so many migrating sentiencies;
thdbe sentiencies themselves being in turn only so many
series of sensations and ideal residues. Everything is
Anatfy tpo- momentary, everything is fluxional, like the fugitive
colours of a, sunset cloud. The sensations and ideas
pass on, lit up with their own light; and beyond them
there is nothing but the void, the primordial nothing-
nmum**- nesg There is no longer any real Self to be clothed
Upon with the successive involucra of the„ Brahmanical
philosophy. The investitures of the Self, the Keshas.
of the TJpanishads, become the aggregates of experien-
1 iteum. * BuddkL
 OF THE .UPANISHADS. 187

tial .elements, the Skandhas of the Buddhist philosophy. Chat. vii.

Buddhism is the philosophy of the Upanishads with
Brahman left out There is no light of lights beyond
the darkness of the world-fiction. The highest end and
final hope of man is a return into the vacuum, the
aboriginal nothingness c5f things. This is Nirvana, the
extinction of the soul; and the path to it is the path of
inertion, apathy, and vacuity.
This then is the primitive antithesis. AsadvSda,
&&nyavada, the theory of the unreality of all things, the
tenet of the void or black, is set up in opposition to
Brahmavada, the doctrine of the foctal spiritual essence.
This antithetic doctrine of the emanation of all things
out of nonentity, is explained and redargued by Sanka-
rSeharya in his gloss on the aphorisms of the "Vedanta.1
The Vedanfc ..is the philosophy of the Upanishads in its
later and systematic shape. The Upanishads are them¬
selves often called Yedantas, or final portions of the
Veda.
“The Buddhists,” he says,.“try to prove that what
is comes out of what is not, according to a formula they
have that nothing that comes out of another thing can guddhiat
come out of it without the previous suppression of that
thing. Thus it is only from a seed that has already
ceased to exist that a plant begins to germinate; only
from milk that has ceased to exist that curds are pro
duoed; only from a piece of day that has ceased to
exist that a pot is made by the potter. They say that
if things emanated out of an imperishable principle
such as the impersonal.Self, anything might emanate
from anything; there being no particularity, as there is
bo limit to the po.wer of such a principle. The plant,
the curds, and the pot come into being out of the
already non-existent seed, milk, and day. They hold
then that entity emanates out of nonentity.
“ The reply we make is that entity cannot emanate
1 &rinduunlm&iu3bhaabya, ii 2, 26,
 183 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap.vin oufc of nonentity; wliat is cannot come out of wh t-is

not. If 8very cause is alike already non-existent, it is
senseless to talk of particular things only emanating
out of other particular things. Grant the seed, the
millr, the clay, and so forth, to he already nonentities,
being suppressed to make way for the plant, the curds,
the plot that come into being out of them, and there will
be no difference between these several nonentities, they
being all characterless alike; just as there is no dif¬
ference between the horns of a hare, the flowers in the
sky, and the like pieces of absurdity. Thus the Bud¬
dhist plea that everything in particular must emanate
out of something in particular, the plant, out of a-seed
and nothing but a seed, and so on, comes to nothing,* If
things fcan come out of a characterless nullity the plant,
the curds, the pot, and so forth may coma out of such
mere nullities as the horns of a hare and the flowers
in the sky, and every one sees that this is not the
case.
If, on the other hand, the Buddhist contends for a
difference between this, that, and the other nullity, just
as this^ that, and the other lotus differ, this being blue,
that red, and the other white; his nothings will become
somethings, as much as the lotuses themselves are
somethings. A nothing cannot give birth to a some-
thingtfor the very good reason thatra nothing is a nothing.
The horns of the hare and the flowers of the Sky are
nothings, and as nothings they give birth to nothing.
“ If entity came out of nonentity, every entity that
has come into being would be nonentitative, and this is
not the case, for every one can see that each and every
entity is ehtitative in its own particular modes of being.
Everything is of the same nature as that outr of wnich
it has had its origin. No one imagines the pots that
have been made of clay, and retain the nature of clay;
to have been woven out of threads, or imagines textile
fabrics to have bee&rfashioned out of clay. Every one
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 189

is sufficiently aware that earthenware things are only Chap. vn.

new forms of earth.
“ As for the Buddhist assertion that things that are
come Tout of things that are not, nothing coming into
being prior to the suppression of' the'thing it came ont
of,—this is false. Every one sees that things can only
be made out of things that continue to exist; bracelets
out of gold that continues to have its being in the
bracelets, and so on. If you suppress the proper nature
of the seed, the power of germination and the future
plant are suppressed along with it.- The plant pro¬
ceeds just out of those elements of the seed that have
not perished, but which go on existing in the plant that
grows up out of them. This tenet, <then, of the emana¬
tion of the existent out of the non-existent is inadmis¬
sible; inasmuch as we see, on the one hand, that entity
does not issue out of nonentity,—you cannot make a
bow out .of a pair of hare’s horns, or a garland out of
sky-flowers; and, on the other hand, that entity does
issue out of entity, as golden trinkets are made out of
existing gold, and other things out of things that are.”
It is thus that >3ankarachaiya refutes the Asadvada,
&&nyavada, or nihilism of the Buddhists. Elsewhere he
points out that the last residuum of abstraction car¬
ried to its highest point is not nonentity, but entity.
The entity thus reached is, of course, a pure indeter¬
mination of being; and the principle of movement to
account for the existence of all the variety of life is
found in Maya. All differences are figments of illu¬
sion ; the pure indifference of being, thought, and bliss
alone is true.
Let us now see how the great Indian schoolman
States and refutes the Vijnariavada or sensationalism
of the Buddhists. 'The statement and refutation of this
theory also are taken from his gloss on the aphorisms
of the Vedanta.1
1 &GritalcMnim&ns&bhSili7* it I, 28.
 190 THE PHILOSOPHY

Oau.-yii. “ The theory of the sensationalists proposes to account

for the -whole world of everyday life, with its cognitions
and cognisable objects, as something internal, as only a
form taken by the mind of the migrating setftiency.
They say that even if there were things ohtside the
mind, the distinction between the perceptions and
the things perceived could only be furnished by the-
mind itself. If you ask, they say, how -it can be known
that all the things of daily life are.internal to the mind
and that there are no outward things, it must be re¬
plied that external things are impossible. The external
things you plead for, they continue, must be either
atoms, or masses made up of atoms, such, as posts and
pillars and the like. Now, atoms cannot present them¬
selves as posts and pillars, for there is no presentation
of an atom; nor, again, can masses of atoms present
themselves as posts and pillars, for. you could hot say
whether these posts and pillars were the same or not
the same as the atoms. In the same way it mey be
shown, they say, that the external things are ndt.uni-
versals, or qualities, or actions.”
We do not know that the post is a mass of atoms,
because we do not know that the several atoms, each of
which is beyond all perception, can come together in
such a way as to form a mass that can be seen and
handled. Again, if.the posts and pillars and other
- outward things are not atoms, or made up of atoms,
they cannot be placed under the category of substance.
The sensationalist is represented as employing the lan¬
guage of the Naiyayikas and Va&eshikas, and requir¬
ing to find some one or other of their categories under,
which to place the outward things which are under
dispute. They cannot be placed under the, head-of
substance, for substances are, in the Naiyayika and
VaifeBhfka philosophies, atomic aggregates. The sen¬
sationalist proceeds to try whether they can be placed
under either of the three categories of universality,
 OF THE VPANISHADS.

quality, or action, there being no other category under Chaj*. vil

which they could possibly be ranked. He finds that they
cannot, for every universal, every quality, and every
action is either one with the thing to which it belongs
.or not one with .it. If it is one with it, the thing is a
thing no more; if it is not one with it, it cannot stand
to it in any other relation than that of an independent
thing outside it, and such an independent thing it
cannot be. Such appears to be Anandagiri’s explana¬
tion of this obscure argument:.
. “Further, they say, the particularisation of the
several cognitions as they succeed each other in the
mind, in such a way that this is a cognition Of a post,
that of a wall, this of a water-pot, that of a piece of
doth, and so on,—this particularisation supposes some
distinction in the cognitions themsdves, and you must
admit that 'the cognition has the same form as the object
cognised. This once admitted, the hypothesis of the ex¬
istence of external things is gratuitous; for the forms of
the objects are not without but within the cognitions.
“Again, as the perceptions and the percepts are
always presented simultaneously, and as if one be not
presented the other is not presented, they are insepar¬
able. They would not be inseparable if they were not
really one in nature; for if they were two different things,
there would be nothing to prevent the presentation of
the one in the absence of the .other. There is* there¬
fore no external world.
“ The' nature of external perception is similar to
that of a dream... The presentments we call posts and
pillars and so forth, appear to us in our waking expe¬
rience in a relation of subject and object; precisely in
th* same way that the presentments of a dream, of an
illusion, of a mirage, or of a reverie, appear to us in the
relation of subject and object; and in each state equally
in the absence of any things external to us. In each
state the presentments are alike presentments.
 . 192 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chat. YU. “Jf you ask iis, they proceed, how to account for all
- ' the variety of the .presentments of the senses, in the
absence of.external things to give rise to that variety;
it may be replied that this variety proceeds from the
. variety of ideal residues of past sensations. There has
been no beginning to the process oAhe aeons; and thus
there is no reason to deny that sensations give rise to.
ideas and ideas to fresh sensations, in the same way
that the seed produces the plant and the plant the seed
in endless progress, and thus give rise to all the variety
that is around us. You, they say, no less than we our¬
selves, teaeh that in dreams and reveries the variety of
the consciousness arises from the variety of residual
ideas or mental images, and there is proof enough that
variety of ideas is followed by variety of presentments,
and want of variety in the ideas by want of variety in
the presentments. We do not allow that the variety
in perception is due to the action of external things.
And thus again we assert that there is no external
world.”
Such is {§ankaracharya’s statement of the Buddhist
theory of sensationalism. His refutation of that theory
proceeds upon an appeal to the primitive convictions
of the human race. The reader will be interested in
remarking to how great an extent the arguments of
Reid and his successors are anticipated by the Indian
schoolmen perhaps more than eleven hundred years
ago. The refutation is as follows:—
s'nkuft- "“ To all this we reply that external things do exist.
It.is impossible to judge that external things have no
existence, and why ? because we are conscious of them.
In every act of perception some one or other outward
thing is presented to the consciousness, be it post or
wall, or doth or jar, or whatever else it may be; and
that of which we are conscious cannot but exist. . If a
man, at the very moment he is conscious of outward
tilings through his senses, tells us that he is not con-
 OF THE UPA MISHAPS. *93

scious of them, and that they have no existence, why

should we listen to him, any more than we should
listen to a man who, in the moment of eating and
enjoying, tol<J us that he was not eating and was not
enjoying what he ate ?
" Perhaps you will reply that you do not say you are
not conscious of any object, but only that you are not
conscious of an object external to the consciousness.
Yes, it is true that you say this, but you say it in the
plenitude of your self-conceit, and you say nothing
that you can prove. The consciousness itself certifies
to us that the thiug is external to the consciousness.
2fo one is conscious of the post and the wall as forms
of perception, and every plain man knows that the post
and the wall are the objects of perception. It is thus
that all ordinary people perceive things. The. sensa¬
tionalists repudiate external things and at the same
time talk about them freely, as when they say that the
percept is internal and that it only appears to be ex¬
ternal They are all the while dealing with a percep¬
tion that all the World knows'to be external; and as
they insist on refusing an external world, they say the
external thing only seems to be external If there be
nothing external how can anything seem external, that
is, be like an external thing ? No one says; Vishiju-
mitra looks like the son of a childless mother. If we
are to accept the truth as it is given to us in our expe¬
rience, we must affirm that the thing perceived is pre¬
sented externally, nc.t only that it is presented like an
external tiling.
" I suppose you will rejoin that you decide that the
thing perceived is like an external thing, because it is
impossible that anything should really be external
This is no fit decision, for the possibility and impossi¬
bility of things are to Be learned in the exercise of the
faculties; and the exercise of the faculties is not to
follow any preconception about the possibility or im-
 •
TER PHILOSOPHY:
- ,

Cbui. vil possibility of things. A thing is possible, if it is cog

" nisable in perception or in the exercise of any other,
faculty. A thing is impossible, if it is incognisable to
each and all the faculties. How can yon 8jiy that an
external world is impossible, on the strength’ of diffi¬
culties in the shape of the positive and negative infer¬
ences yon adduce, if the existence of this external'
world is at the same time presupposed in the exercise
of every faculty ?„
" Again, yon cannot argne that there are no outward
objects, on the ground that the perception takes the
form of the outward object; for if there were no out-’
ward Object in existence, the perception could not take
the form of an outward object. Torn will have to admit
then that the reason that the perception and the object
perceived are always presented simultaneously, is not-
that the object is one and the same, with the act of
perception) hut that the object is the occasion of the
perception.
“ Again there is the perception ofA jar, and there is
the.perception of a piece of cloth. Here the difference
lies not in the perception, hut in the things perceived,
the jar and the doth; in the same, way as there axe
white cows and black cows, and these differ, not in
being cows,, but in being the one-white and the other
black. So, farther, there is the perception of a jar and
the-memory or representatioh of a jar, and ill this ease
the'difference lies intheacts of presentation and repre¬
sentation,, sot in .the jar perceived and'represented; in
the same way as the smell of milk and the taste of milk
differ-as smell and'taste, and not in respect to the milk
smelt andtasteo.
" If yon say that the thingwe are conscious of iS the
perception, you should more properly say that the ex¬
ternal thing is that of Which We axe conscious. Ton
will no doubt rejoin that the sensation, as you call the
perception, shines in its own-light like a lamp, and that
 Of THE UPaNSSBAOS. r95

we m be conscious of it, and that the supposed ex-' ctur.vi

ternai thing does not shine in its own light, and that “
we cannot be conscious of it. The. irradiation of the
perception by itself, which you propose, is extremely
absurd^ it is as if you said that a fire burned itself.
At the same time, you am such a great philosopher
that you will not allow the clear, and plain belief of
plain people, that the external thing is presented, to con-
sciousness by a.perceptive.act that is not the thing itself.
It is of no use to urge that a sensation, which is not an
external thing, presents itself to the consciousness, for
to say that a thing acts upon itself is an absurdity.
“ I foresee that you will rejoin that if the sensation
is' to. be apprehended by something not itself, that
something must- again be apprehended by something
not itself, and so ad infinitum. You will also rejoin
that, if there is to be a fresh cognition to cognise the
perception, the perception already shining of itself like
a lamp, the cognition and the perception being.both
alike, the one cannot'-he supposed to shed its light upon
the'other; and thus it is an idle hypothesis that.makes,
the sensation or perception one thing, and the con¬
sciousness of the sensation or perception another thing;
Both your rejoinders1 are null; for there is no need to'
suppose a Consciousness of that which is conscious, viz*
Of the Self‘that witnesses ;or irradiates the perception;
.and we only suppose a consciousness of the perception,
not a consciousness of a consciousness of the percep¬
tion. There is no fear ofan infinite regression. And.
as' regards your.second rejoinder.: the witness or Self
that irradiates the perception and the pereeption that it
irradiates are essentially different, and may . thus be
held to stand to one another in the relation of thing
knowing and: thing known. The witness or Self .is self-
posited, and cannot be repudiated. . .
"When yon talk about, a'sensation, inoognxsabla to,
anay faculty, shining .of itself with nothing ulterior to
 196 THE PHILOSOPHY

Cur. vil give the light of consciousness to it, a sensation that

there is no sentient being to cognise, you might as-well
say that there are a thousand, lamps shining inside such
and such an impenetrable mass of rocks, but„tha-t there
is no one to see them. Ton are talking nonsense.
it

things asserts that the presentments of posts and walls,

and pots and pans, and so forth, in the waking experi¬
ence, arise in the absence of all external things, like the
things seen in a dream; the presentments being present¬
ments alike, and nothing more, whether we wake or
dream. This we deny. The perceptions of the waking
state differ from the presentments of a dream; the per¬
ceptions are not negated, and the presentments of sleep
are negated. On waking out of his. sleep, a man denies
the reality of what he saw in a dream. He says, for
example, that he had a false presentation of an interview
with a great man, but that no such, interview took place,
only, his inward sense was dull and sleepy, and thus the
illusion arose. Eeveries, hallucinations, and the like
states are all negatived, each in' its proper mode of
sublation; but the thing perceived in the waking state,
be it post or pillar, or what it may, is never nega¬
tived in any later state of mind. The visions of a
dream are representations, the visions of the waking
experience are presentations; and the distinction be¬
tween perception and memory, or presentation and
representation, is self-evident. In perception the thing
is present, in memory it is absent When I recollect
the son I am missing, I do not perceive him, but only
want tov perceive him. It is of no avail for you to
assert that the presentations of the waking experience
are as false sis the presentments of a dream, in. that both
are alike presentments and nothing more; for you a^e
all the time yourself conscious of the difference between
presentations and representations.”
^ankaracharva’s arguments will at'first sight appear
 OF THE VPANISHADS, 197

inconsistent with his doctrine of the unreality of all c&ur. Ylli-

things save the one and only Self. Has not he told us i»s'autai*-
himself that the world is only a series of dreams, through
which the soul is fated to wander until it recover its
unity with the sole reality, the fontal spiritual essence ? pjSS&Jt?
The.inconsistency will be seen to he less than it ap-raiJ*
pears, if we remember that the external things in his
philosophy, the philosophy of the Upanishads, are as
real as the minds that perceive them. This degree of
reality they have, and the .presentments of a dream
have not. . Individual souls and their environments are
true for the many; they have an existence sufficient
to account for all that goes on in daily life; they are
real1 from the standpoint of everyday experience. The
visions of a dream are false from this standpoint. In¬
dividual souls and their environments are false for the
reflective few1; their existence disappear? hi the higher
existence, to be won by abstraction and spiritual intui¬
tion; they are unreal* from the standpoint of meta¬
physical truth. So long as a man is engaged in the
avocations of common life, the things he has to deal
with are real enough for him. If neither he nor they
have the true and real being* that belongs to Self
alone, they have their own conventional existence,4 an
existence that is enough to account for all we are and
do and suffer. If we use the language of metaphysical
truth, we must say that the existence of the soul and
its environment, apart from the- Self, is only enough to
account for all we stev1 to be and do and suffer; that
it • is spurious, fictitious, mere semblance; that it may
be negatived by spiritual intuition or ecstasy. But
such an existence is veiy different from the merely
apparent existence6 of the presentments of the dream¬
ing phantasy, which are negatived by the ordinary
experience of the unphilosophic man. . This conven-
i I&uk#Mvwta]i&r<tiah. * Pctl/VLnuirtfiG%cih+ * Ptiswnartih&ki tuttS*
4 Vy&vahariii 9atta. 6 PrdtibhMH utML
 •198 TRB PHILOSOPH Y
caw. vil iional existence of .souls end tlieifc environments is. afi
' . apparent existence for the philosopher; not an apparent
existence for the many; for them it is real enough. They
at least find'no lack of truth in the miseries they have
to go through, • Beyond the apparent existence of the
images; of a dream there is a lower depth of unreality,
the.unreality that belongs to such mere figments of the
imagination as the horns of a hare, the flowers of the
sky, the son of a childless mother. These things' are
the nonsensical pure and simple.1 Now the world-fiction
and its figments, souls, and the things .they see and do
and suffer, are uot pure and simple nonsense; not things
that have a merely apparent existence even for the
many but things that have a conventional existence
for tire many, and an apparent and fictitious existence
Only for the philosophic few, who have attained to an
insight into the one lugh veiity,. the sole, existence of
the characterless Self.
TbepbUo- Judging the succession of Indian systems by the
nature of the notions they, exhibit, apd there is no
other way to jadge.it, the system, that follows next will
gjgjgL* be the philosophy of the Sankhyas. In this philosophy, ‘
with the purpose of presenting a firmer front against
£ the’ Buddhists, a still higher degree of. realioy is assigned
«w»«. jfco the mind and its environments, to the world at large.
than in the primitive Indian philosophy,’the philosophy
of the Upaniskads. The world is said to have a sepa¬
rate and independent origin or principle of emanation;
it comes oat of Prakriti. or Pradhana. This Prakriti or
principle of emanation is the.equilibrium of the three
primordia rerun of Indian philosophy, pleasure, pain,
and indolence or indifference. These are the basal
sensibility out of which, on an impulse* given by the
law of nemesis that upsets their equilibrium, mind,* as
yet unconscious, emanates; from.tnind personality4 pie»-
* Tvdcihdm&lra. GmvxXthobha, PnxkriUkshubhq.
1 Btddki * 4/.<midm.
 OF THE UPANISHADS. m '

eeejjs, and from personality the as yet Imperceptible cgir. yit

rudiments of the world, and so on. The world is thus
a reality* no illusion, not a figment-»world even for the
philosppher. It is real for him, as well as for tlie
multitude. '. This is the first step the' Sankhyas, or
enumerative: philosophers, take in the direction of
common sense. They take a second step in the same
disection, at the expense, it must be expressly stated, pWasena*
pf their ingenuousness, by pretending. that the > term upwfchad*
Brahman:in the Upanishads is only a collective term
for a plurality of Selves Or Purushas.. They say that
the texts of the Upanishads that teach that all souls
are one. in the unity of the one and only Self, merely
assert a common nature in all souls. There are many
Selves, they pretend, and their unity is generic,. not
numerical/ This is a mere tour de force on the part of
tbc Sankhyas^ as must be evident enough tb any afcten*
tive reader of the preceding chapters of this work,
They^further say that when Brahman is said in the
Upanishads to be the p'incipium, the origin of the
worlds, the term Brahman is only a synonym for Pra-
kyiti or Pradhana: a perfectly, monstrous assertion.
They allow full reality to the Purushas or Selves, and
& lower hut still trite and , independent reality to the
minds and bodies and environments of the Purushas,
.These minds, bodies, and environments are emanations,
out of Prakyiti, and are said by the Sankhyas to have
a practical or conventional existence, inasmuch as they
are in . unceasing change, and never at a stand; The.
world is not negatived for them, not sublated, by a per**
feet, knowledge, as it is in the primitive philosophy of
the Upanishads, but the Purusha is. detached from it,
The* mind ceases to mirror its ceaseless modes upon,
that Purusha'or Self on which a perfect knowledge, has
been reflected. Mind is reflected or mirrored on the
Purushas, and the Purushas give light to mind, the
light of consciousness, A soul. is extricated from
 2C6 THE PHILOSOPHY

•CuAfr.viL metempsychosis as often as one of the Furuslias is

separated from the mind, so soon as* the world ceases to
cast its reflections upon it, and to shine in its light.
In support of their thesis that the world has an
independent and real principle, Prakriti or Pradhana,
the Sankhyas bring forward in particular two passages
of the Upanishads, one from the Katha and the other
from the fSmaSvatara. A translation of the iSvetaiva-
tara will be given in the next chapter. It is necessary,
before giving it, to discuss the position of the Sankhya
philosophy, as the $Yeta6vatara TJpanishad has been
sometimes thought to lend.countenance to. Sankhya
teaching, or to be in fact a Sankhya Upanishad
in the. Before looking, at the passages the Sankhyas insist
upon as teaching their views, it must be holed that
forAridy&or Prakriti is often used in the philosophy of the Upani-
shads and the Vedanta precisely as a synonym for
Avidya or Maya, the self-feigning World-fiction, and
that Parasha is also often used as a precise equivalent
for Brahman the one and Only Self. In fact, if we pay
attention to the strictly Vedantic teaching of the &vet§£-
vatara Upanishad and the Bhagavadglta, and to the
Sankhya language in which that teaching is couched,
as also to the references they make to Kapila and
Jaimini, the reputed authors of the Sankhya and Toga
or demiurgic Sankhya systems, the only conclusion
that we can form is that the Sankhya was originally
nothing more than a nomenclature for the principles
of the philosophy of the Upanishads; and that the
distinctive tenets of the subsequent Sankhya school,
viz., the independence and reality of Prakriti and the
plurality of Purushas, are later developments. In its
origin the Sankhya appears to have been nothing ntore
than a series of terms to note the successive emanations
from Prakriti or Maya. It was only in later times that
it became a separate philosophy. It is beyond all doubt
that the teaching of the &veta£vatara Upanishad and
 OF TEE UPANISHA DS. 301

df the Bhagavadglta, notwithstanding their Sankhya chap. yii.

phrases and Sankhya references, is as purely Vedantic
as that of any Vedantic work whatever.
The passage of the Katha Upanishad which the San- s'aaiuxicu>7
- khyas produce in support of their peculiar tenets is as
follows I—
“ For their objects are beyond and nfore subtile than *hmd'
the senses; the common sensory is beyond the objects,
the mind is beyond the sensory, and the great soul is
beyond the mind.
“ The ultimate and undeveloped principle is beyond
that great soul, and Purusha the Self is beyond the un¬
developed principle. Beyond Purusha there is nothing;
that is-the goal, that is the final term.”
The Sankhvas hold that the undeveloped principle
of this passage is their own Prakriti or Pradhana, the
independent principle out of which the world proceeds,
and that the mind here mentioned is their own second
principle, the first emanation out of Prakriti. Sankari-
cbarya examines this view in the beginning of the fourth
section of the first book of his commentary on the
aphorisms of the Vedanta, and undertakes to prove from
the context that the undeveloped principle is not the
Pradhana the Sankhyas, but the world-fiction Maya,
which is the body of ISvara,1 the body out of which- all
things emanate. The great soul mentioned in this pas¬
sage is, he says, either the migrating soul, or the divine
emanation Hiranyagatbha. The text is the immediate
sequel of the allegory of -the chariot “ The text,” he
says, “ does not indicate any such independent prin¬
ciple of emanation as the PradhSna of the Sankhya
tradition. The word wndeveloped is merely a negative
term, the negative of the developed. It applies there¬
fore to something imperceptible and inscrutable, but
it is not' to be taken as a special name of a special
thing. It is not the current name of an entity. It Is
1 The cosmic body, the tdraya&cr&w.
 THE PHILOSOPHY.

Chap. YU true that the term is one of the technicalities. of the

Sankhyas, and with them a synonym of their Pradhana,
hat in explaining the sense of the Yedic text it is not
to he taken as the specific name of the .principle of
emanation. ' The order of .enumeration is similar to the
order in which the Sankhyas enumerate their principles;,
but that is no proof that the things enumerated are the
same. No one in his senses oh finding an ox in
horse’s stall would pronounce it to he a horse. We
The undeve¬
have only to look'at the allegory of the chariot, which
loped prin¬
ciple of the
immediately precedes the words of the text, to find that
KathaUpani-
ahad not
the undeveloped principle is not the Pradhana invented
Pradhana but
IClyi, the
by the Sankhyas, hut tire cosmic body, the body of t$vara,
co*mic body,
the body d:
out of which all things emanate. In this allegory the
Is*vara, the
oottnlo aouL
soul is seated in a . chariot, and the body is the chariot.
“ Know that the soul is seated in a chariot, and that
the body, is that chariot. Know that the mind is the
charioteer, and that the will is the reins.
"They say that the senses are the horses, and that
the things of sense are the roads. The wise declare
that the migrating soul is the Self fictitiously present
in the body, senses, and common sensory.”
If the senses are not held in. check, the soul pro¬
ceeds to further migrations. If they are held in check,
it reaches the farther limit of its journey, the sphere
of Vishnu the supreme. The sphere of Vishnu tire
supreme is shown to he the one and only Self, the
farther limit of its journey, as being beyond the senses,
and the other things enumerated in the text. Sounds,
colours, and other sensible objects, the roads' along
which the horses run, are beyond the senses.. The
common sensory is said to lie beyond these sensible
objects, because the operation of the senses upon their
objects is determined by the common sensory. The
mind is said to be beyond the common sensory, .be¬
cause every mode of pleasurable and painful experience
accrues to the migrating soul only through the xiiind.
 OF THE. UFANISHADS. 203

The great soul said to be beyond the mind is the Chap, vil
'migrating soul, the occupant of the chariot. It is said
to be great because- it is the possessor. Or the great
soul may mean the soul of Hiranyagarbba, the first
emanation out of Igvara, great as being the sum of all
individual minds. The body, then, is the only thing
left to be accounted for in the allegory of the chariot,
and it follows that the body is the undeveloped prin¬
ciple. It will be asked how the body, a visible and
tangible thing, can be spoken of as the undeveloped.
The undeveloped is surely something invisible and in¬
tangible. It must be replied that the body here spoken
of is invisible and intangible, the cosmic body, the body
oflSvara, out of which all things emanate. This body
is the world-fiction; and thus the undeveloped principle
in the text is the potential world of name and colour,
the world before it has come into being, as yet name¬
less and colourless, the power of the seed of the world-
tree not yet passing into actuality.**
The second of the texts of highest importance to the
pretensions of the Sankhyas, is a verse of the SvetSiva-
tara Upanishad. dib*n©w«a_
b " There is one unhorn being, red, white, and black,
that gives birth to many offspring like herself. One
unborn soul lingers in dalliance with her, another leaves
.her* his dalliance with her ended.*’
The S&nkliyas contend that the one birthless pro-
creant, red, white, and black, here spoken of, is Prakriti
or Pradhana, the independent originative principle of
the world, the equipoise of the tlirere primordia rerum ;
pain being spoken of as red, pleasure as white, and
'indifference as black. One Purusha lingers with her,
passing from body to body; another leaves her as soon
as he has passed through the pains and pleasures of
metempsychosis and attained to liberation. Sankara?
charya urges that this text by Itself is insufficient to
prove that the doctrine of Pradhfiha lias any Vedic war*
 204 TUB PHILOSOPHY.

<Jhap.vn. rant.1 The text must be interpreted in accordance

with the context, and in harmony with a similar pas-
' sage in the Chhanddgya Upanishad: “ The red colour of
fire is the colour of heat, white is the colour of water,
and black the colour of earth.’' The plain indication
of the context is that the unborn one is Maya or j§akti,
the fiction of the Archimagus or power of the Demiur¬
gus, or livara, the universal soul or world-projecting
deity. The Chhandogya Upanishad teaches how this
creative power, the potentiality of name and colour, is
developed into heat, water, and earth, out of which the
bodies of plants, and animals, and man are fashioned.
The unborn souls in the text are pot the Purushas of the
Sankhya philosophy, but the Jlvas or migrating souls
of the Vedanta. The birthless procreant is explained
also in &ankaracharya’s commentary1 on the J§yeta4-
. vatara Upanishad to be the Maya or Sakti, the fiction
or the power of the Demiurgus, that develops into heat,
water, and earth. The Maya or Prakyiti of the Vedanta
is often described in the same way as the Pradhana or
Prakfiti of the Sankhyas, as the union of the three
primordia rerum, trigwi&tmika maya. The Yedantins
have therefore no interested motive in identifying the
red, white, and black with the colours of light, water,
and earth, rather than with pain, pleasure, and indolence.
£ankarich&rya’s exposition is certainly the natural, no
less than the traditional and authoritative, interpretation
of the text. In fact, the teaching of the Jsvetaivatara is
precisely the same as that of the other Upanishads.
Another point at issue between the Sankhyas and the
Vedantins, or followers of the philosophy of the Upani-
shads, should he noted. This is that the Sankhyas deny
•wMn* the existence of the I&rara, Demiurgus, or world-proj€fcfc-
r ing deity, proclaimed in the Upanishads. The Sankhye
teaching in this matter may he given in the words c
* forfr»h«irfmSii»abhHafay», ■ ,j. * gTetiUrftUronuibbAdblaihvt
4. S, and 9. ir. 5. J
Vaghaspatimi&a in his Sankhjatattvakittmudl, or eluci¬
dation of the Sankhya principles. “The unconscious,”
he says, 41 is seen to operate towards an end; the uncon¬
scious milk of the cow, for example, operates towards
the growth of the calf. It is in the same way that
Pralqriti, the principle of emanation, unconscious as it is,
acts with a view to the liberation of Purushas or Selves.
A Vedantin may urge that the operation of the milk is
not solely the work of an unconscious thing, the milk
operating under the supervision of ISvara. But this
plea is useless, for every intelligent being acts either
from self-interest or from beneficence, as we see in the
life of the present day. Neither self-interest nor bene¬
ficence can have had any part to play in the evolution
of the world, and therefore the world has not an intelli¬
gent author. A creator who has already all he can
desire, can "Lave no interest in creating anything; nor
can he be imagined to operate from a motive of bene¬
ficence. Prior to a fresh creation or palingenesia of the
world there is no misery, as the migrating souls have
neither bodies, senses, nor environments. What is
there, then, that the tenderness of the Demiurgus could
wish to extricate them from ? ,If you say that the
beneficence of fbe Demiurgus has reference to the
misery of the souls to come as soon as he has made the
world or projected the spheres-of recompense, this plea
implies a logical circle yon will not be able to get out of;
the act of creation will proceed from the beneficence
of the world-projecting deity, and his beneficence will
proceed from the act of creation. What is more, a
Demiurgus actuated by beneficence would not create
sentient beings under disparate conditions, but in a
state of co-equal happiness. Disparity of conditions,
you rejoin, proceeds from disparity of works in former
iives. If so, away, say we, with this superintendence
of works, and the. recompense of works by a supreme
intelligence.. - It is easier to suppose that the blind and
 20$ THE PHILOSOPHY

Cbap. vii.fatal operation of the law of retribution sets Prukfiti at

work in evolving the spheres of recompense; for there
•would be no misery at all but for the evolution of
bodies, senses, and environments out of Prakjiti by the
law of retribution.”
s'lakui. ■ Sankaracharya undertakes to refute tliis tenet of the
Sankhyas, and to maintain the existence of the Ilvara
or Demiurgus proclaimed in the philosophy of ths
VpnWuris Upauishads. His refutation is as follows:1—
fer110 "It is argued that the Demiurgus cannot be the
principle out of which the world emanates, and why ?
because he would be unjust and cruel. He .makes
some living beings extremely -happy, as the gods;
otners extremely miserable, as the lower animals; to
others, is to men, he assigns an intermediate position.
If the Demiurgus creates so unequal a world, he must
have the same preferences and aversions as one of our¬
selves, and there will be an end to the purity and other
divine attributes given to him in revelation and tradi¬
tion. Hay, he must be pitiless and cruel to a degree
that even bad men would reprobate, as first involving,
his creatures in misery, and then retracting them all
into himself, to be projected out of himself again. The
Demiurgus, then, is not the principle of origination of
the world. To this we reply, that injustice and Cruelty
do not attach to the Demiurgus, aud why 1 because he
acts with reference to something beyond himself. He.
would be indeed unjust and cruel, if he'acted altogether'
of himself in .evolving this nneqnal world; but it is hqt
.of himself but with reference to something farther that
he projects the spheres of recompense. Tou -ask ih
reference to what. In reference, we reply, to the good
and evil that* the migrating souls have done*in. their
former lives. The world is a . world of inequalities,
because of the various works that have to be recom¬
pensed to the migrating souls that are' projected anew
1 jWtrOTh»mTmSnsg]phflgb7», H. i, 34-36.
 OF THE ltPAmSBADS. 207

at -the beginning of each son, and the Demiurgus is not Cup: vh.
to blame. The Demiurgus may be likened to a rain- ^
cloud. The cloud is the one cause alike of the growth «»to
of ricfe, barley, and-other kinds of grain; and the pecu-
liar, possibilities of the various seeds are what make the loU-
one to grow up as rice, the other as barley, the others
as other kinds of grain. The Demiurgus is in like
manner the one common principle of the evolution of
gods, men, animals, and other creatures.; and thepecu-
liar works, good and evil, of the several migrating souls
give rise to their different embodiments, divine and
human, and the rest. The Demiurgus is not guilty of
injustice or cruelty, inasmuch as he operates in crea¬
tion in conformity to the law of retribution. You ask
how we know that he acts in conformity to this law-in
producing these higher, middle, and lower spheres of
recompense. "We know it because Yedic revelation
teaches it in the texts,—If- he wishes to raise up a soul
into-a higher embodiment, he makes it do.good works/
and if he wishes to lead a soul down into a lower em¬
bodiment,he makes it do evil works; and,Anian becomes
holy by holy works and unholy by unholy works in pre-t
vious lives, • Tradition also teaches that the favour
and disfavour of the world-projecting deity are propor¬
tionate to the good and' evil works of the migrating
souls, in such words as,—I receive .-them just as they
approach me.
. “You will argue against all this that there is no
distinction in things prior to creation, and that there¬
fore prior to creation there is no law of retribution
to account for the inequalities of the world that is to
be, the Vedic text saying, Existent only, my son, was
this in the beginning/ one only, without duality. You
will say that we involve ourselves in a logical circle, in
-saying that the law of retribution is a'result of the
variety of embodiments produced in the creation, and
the variety of embodiments again is a result of the law
 203 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. vil. of retribution. You will further say that the Demi-
— urgus operates in creation with reference to a law of
nemesis that follows after the variety of embodiments,
and that the first creation in the series of creations
must have been one of pure equality, there not having
yet arisen any such retributive fatality in consequence
of a prior variety of embodiments. In all this, we
reply, you produce nothing to disprove our theory of
Th« world >.u the Demiurgus. The series of creations has had no
nilfg^sonu’ beginning. Your plea would be good if the series had
han bun in a beginning, but it has noneand consequently there is
tom eternity, nothing to gainsay the position that the law of retribu¬
tion and the inequalities of life produce and reproduce
each other, like seed and plant and plant and seed.
“You will next ask us how we know that the series
of creations has had no beginning. Our reply is this,-
—that if the series had a beginning, something must.
have come out of nothing; and if something can come,
out of nothing, even liberated souls may have hereafter ’
to return to metempsychosis, and to suffer miseries that
they have.done nothing to deserve. There would no
longer be anything to account for the inequalities of
happiness and misery in the world. This consequence
would be as repugnant to your principles as it is to
ours. The Demiurgus then is not the author of the
inequalities of life. The cosmical illusion in and by
itself is not the source of these inequalities, being
uniform. The world-fiction becomes the source of
these inequalities only bj reason of the law of retri¬
bution, latent in it owing to the residue of good and
evil works as yet unrecompensed. There is no logical.
circle implied in the statement that retribution leads
to bodily life, and bodily life to retribution, for- the.
process of metempsychosis is one that has had no
beginning, and that produces and reproduces itself like
seed and plant, and plant and seed.”
Another point of. difference between the philosophy
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 209
of the Upanishads and the philosophy of the Sankhyas Ohap. m
must be marked. In both philosophies alike, things
are said to pre-exist in the things they emanate out of.
In tne philosophy of the Upanishads the snccessive
emanations are fictitious things1 that present themselves
in the place of the one and only Self as it is overspread *“*“*■
with illusion. In the philosophy of the Sankhyas
the successive emanations2 are’ real modifications of a
real and modifiable principle, Prakyiti. The doctrine
of fictitious emanations is stated in the following
passage of Nrishnhasarasvatl’s SubodhinI, a commen¬
tary on the Vedantasara or Essence of the Upanishads7
“ All the figments of the world-fiction may be made to
disappear in such a way that pure thought or the Self
shall alone remain, in the same manner as the fictitious
serpent seen in a piece of rope maybe made to dis¬
appear, and the rope that underlies it may be made to
remain. The rope was only rope all the time it falsely
seemfed to be a snake. The fictitious world may be
made to disappear as the fictitious snake is made to
disappear, and this is its sublation.* .Anything that
exists in its own proper mode of existence, may pass
into another form in either of two ways—the way of
real emanation, and the .way of fictitious emanation,
Seal emanation takes place when a thing really quits
its present mode of being and assumes a new mode; as
when milk ceases to be pure milk and emanates in the
new form of curdled milk. Fictitious emanation takes
place when a thing remains in its own mode of being,
and at the same time fictitiously presents itself in an¬
other mode; as the piece of rope remains a piece of rope,
bat presents itself as a snake to the belied wayfarer.
In the Vedanta the world of semblances that veils the
Self, is not allowed to be a modification 01; real emana-

1 Vivaria. This doctrine is called Vivartardda.

8 PariQ&ma. This doctrine is called Pari^Smavdda. -
8 Apav&da. b&dha.
O
 210 THE PHILOSOPHY

Cmp.vil tion of the Self; for if the Self were modifiable and
mutable, it would not he, as it is, perduring and eternal
But’in the true doctrine that the world is a false pre¬
sentment or fictitious emanation that presents itself in
the place of the Self, the Self remains unmodified and
immutable.”
In reference to- this same Sankhya tenet of real
emanations ^ankaracharya says: “It is of no use to
raise the question how the variety of creation can arise
without the Self's forfeiting its pure and characterless
being; for it is said in the sacred text that a varied
creation arises in the one and only Self in the dreaming,
state of the souL There are no chariots, no horses, no'
roads, but.it presents to itself chariots, horses, and roads,
and there is in this creation no suppression of the pure
and characterless being of the Self.”1 And again: “ The
Self does not lose its pure and simple nature, for the-
variety of name and colour is only-a figment .of the
world-fiction, a modification of speech only, a chsfnge,
a name. Vedic revelation, in. teaching that all things'
issue out of the Self, does not teach that things are real
emanations or modifications of the Self; the very pur-,
pose of this revelation being to teach that the Self is
the fontal spiritual essence, free from all that is, and
all that is done and suffered, in. the lives we live.”*

1 ^StittkarnimitTiffihhainhya, it * jj,
lb si 1,27. •
 OF rm VPAtflSHADS.

CHAPTER VIII.

THE SVETASVATARA UpANISHAD.

“ The fakirs of India and the monks of the Oriental church were
alike persuaded, that in toad abstraction of the faculties of the mind
andbody, the purer spirit may ascend'to the enjoyment and vision of
the Deity* The opinion and practice of the monasteries of Mount
Athos will be best represented in the words of an abbot who flourished
in the eleventh century. * When thou art alone in thy cell*’ says the
ascetic teacher,* shut thy door and seat thyself in a comer; raise thy
mind above all things vain and transitory; recline thy beard and chin
on thy breast; t an thy eyes and thy thoughts towards the middle of
thy belly, the region of the navel, and search the place of the heart,
the seat of the soul. At first all will be dark and comfortless ; but if
yon per^vere day and night, you will feel *an ineffable joy; and no
sooner has the soul discovered the place of the heart, than it is involved
in a mystic and ethereal light.’ ”—Gibbon.
“ Hypatia' did. not feel her own limbs, bear her* own breath. A light
bright mist., an endless network of glittering films, coming, going,
uniting, resolving themselves, was above her and around her. Was
she in the body or out of the body ? The network faded into an abyss
of still clear light. A still warm atmosphere was around her, thrilling
tljpough $0(1 through her. She breathed the light and floated in it, as
a mote in the midday beam. Kingsley.

The perusal of the ^vetaivatara, Upanishad will satisfy Chap. vin.

the .reader that its teaching is the same as that of Th.s^etwv^
the other TJpanishads, the teaching that finds its full
and legitimate expression in the system known as the
Vedanta. Notwithstanding Sankhya phrases, and re-
ferences to the .Sankhya philosophy and its reputed
funder, Kapila, this Upanishad, like the other Upani
shads, teaches the unity of souls in the one and only
Self; the unreality of the world as a series of figments
of the self-feigning world-fiction; and as the first of
the fictitious emanatipns, the existence of the Demi-
 213 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chip. vm. urgus or universal soul present in every individual

~ soul, the deity that projects the world out of
that the migrating souls may find the recompense of
their works in former lives. The &veta$vatara' Upani-
shad in Sankhya terms propounds the very principles
that the Sankhya philosophers make it their business
ThoBtakhya to subvert. The inference is that the Sankhya was
originally only an enumeration of the successive emana-
JfouifoFtfe tions out of MayS or Prakriti, a precise series of terms
of to note the primitive philosophy of the Upanishads,
ltad^ and that.the distinctive tenets of what is now known
as the Sankhya philosophy are later developments.
The most important of these later tenets are, as has
been seen, the Reality and independence of Prakriti or
Pradhana, the reality of the emanations of Prakriti,
the plurality of Purushas or Selves, and die negation
of an XiSvara or world-projecting deity.
The &veta£vatara Upani'shad is an Upanishad pf the
Taittirlya or Black Becension of the Yajurveda. This '
Upanishad is marked by several peculiarities. It em¬
ploys Sankhya terms, and refers to Eapila, the first
teacher of the Sankhya philosophy; a philosophy that
seem3 to have been in its earliest form only a fresh,
dear statement of the emanation of the world out of
Maya; Prakriti being a precise equivalent of Avidya or
Maya, and Puriisha of Brahman, the one and only Self.
Its language is compressed and at times a little obscure;
but its teaching is full'and’explicit, and- it is very-
frequently referred to by the Indian schoolmen for the-
purrose of enforcing and illustrating their doctrines..
K is particularly insistent on the practice of Toga, or
the fixation ’of the body and limbs in a rigid and
insensible posture, and the crushing of every feeling,
desire, and thought in order to rise to the ecstatic
vision of and re-union with the Sell The DemiurguS
dr world-projecting deity is in this TJpanishad iden¬
tified -with Budra, Hara, or Siva. It will be remem-
 OF THE VPANISHADS. 213

beped that S§iva is the. divine self-torture^ the' typical chav, vui*
Yogin, and that the worship of this deity is supposed
to have been adopted from the indigenous tribes of the
HimalaytL
The SvetSlvatara Upanishad is as follows:—
.1. Oil The expositors of Brahman, say. What is rway
the origin of all things ? Is it the Self ? What do we FiKts«etta.
borne out of, what do we live by, and what do we pass
back into ? Tell us, you who know Brahman,'what we
are actuated by as we continue amidst the . pleasures,
and pains of life.
“ Is the source of things to be held to be time, or
the nature of the things themselves, or the fatal retri¬
bution, or chance, or the elements, or the personal soul ?
The aggregate of these is not the origin of things; for
that aggregate exists not for its own sake, but for the
sake of the soul. The soul again is not competent to
be the origin of the world, for there is some further
causfi pf the pleasures and pains the soul goes through.”
“ Sages pursuing ecstatic union by fixing the thoughts AntMng«^
upon a single point have come to see that the source of tb*s'*kti'
of all thing; is the power of the divine spirit,1 the£'J£jM»
power that is hidden beneath the things that emanate SetSo!t3fi»
out of it It is that one deity that actuates aud con¬
trols all those proposed principles of emanation, in¬
cluding time and the personal soul”
It cannot be the migrating soul itself that makes the
vision of the world, for this soul is subject to the law
of retribution, and has no choice in regard to the
spheres of recompense it is to pass through. It is not
the Self as it is in and by itself that is the source of
the world; Brahman per se is neitber the origin nor not
thG origin of things. Brahman, as fictitiously oven-
spread. by the world-fiction, becomes the first of
manifested and unreal beings, the Archimagus, the
arch-illusionist, .the world-evolving deity* All things -
1 The&Wof Urst*.
 214 THE PHILOSOPHY

CtoAfc vnr. Originate out of bis illusion, bis ^creative power, $Laya,
j§akti, Prakriti; and .this power of the divine spirit or
D.emiurgus, is veiled from all eyes beneath the suc¬
cessive .emanations that proceed out of it and maj&e up
the world of migrating souls and their environments.
Is'T&rm is the “ We meditate upon that deity, the Demiurgus, a$
cycle of the
uutrerae. the wheel with one felly and three tires, with sixteen
peripheries, with fifty spokes and twenty wedges to %
the spokes, a wheel that is multiform, with one cord;
with three diverse paths, and with one illusion pro¬
ceeding from two causes.”
The' creative spirit, Kvara, is the Brahmachakra,
the wheel of Brahman, or maze of metempsychosis.
The one felly is the cosmieal illusion. The .three tirefc
•are the three pHmordia rerum, the three Gunas, Safctva,
Rajas, and Tamas, pleasure, pain, and indolence. The
sixteen peripheries are the five elements, the five senses,
the five organs of motion, and the common sensory.
The fifty spokes are fifty varieties* of mental creation
enumerated by the Sankhyas. The twenty wedges are
the five senses, the five organs of motion, and the objects
of each. The one cord is desire. The three several paths
are the path of obedience to the prescriptive sacra,
the path of neglect of these, and the path of gnosis.1
The two causes of illusion are the good and evil works
that prolong the migration of the soul through spheres
of recompense, so long as it fails to find its real nature
The river of “We meditate upon that deity as the river with five
metexnpsy-
cho»it streams from five springs, the river swift and winding,
with the organs of motion as its waves, with the five
senses and the common sensory as its fountain-head,
with five eddies, swollen and rapid with fivefold misery,
with five infirmities as its five reaches ”
The five streams are the five senses, and the five
springs are the five elements. The five eddies are tbs
five objects of sense. The five miseries are the misery
1 Dharma^. ad/tarma, judna.
 OF THE UPANISHADS. «5

prior to birth, and the pains .of birth, decay, sickness, our. rja
and. death- The five infirmities are those, of the Sankhya
enumeration, illusion, mistake of the not-self for self,
desire, aversion; and terror:' These are the five reaches
of the river of metempsychosis. The common sensory,
manes, is said to be its fountain-head,, because every
phase of experience it a modification of this sensory. -
“ The migrating soul wanders in this wheel or- maze
of Brahman, in which all things live and into which
they shall return, so long as it . thinks itself separate
from the deity that actuates it from within; but it goes
to immortality as soon as it is favoured by that deity.
'"This Self is sung as the supreme Brahman. Upon Tt«tri*d—o»
it is' the triad '; it is the firm base of all things, and is dhShffffi.
imperishable. They who.in this world know the Self,
*o goon as they know it and meditate on it alone, are “nBr*hm*n-
merged in the Self, and freed from future births.”
' The.triad that fictitiously overlies, or presents itself
in the place of Brahman, is the migrating soul, their
environments, and the universal soul or Demiurgns.
These are alike unreal, mere figments of the world-
fiction, and Brahman alone is, and is unchanging and
imperishable.
"The powerful. Demiurgns upholds the world, both
its principle and its manifested forms, the imperish¬
able principle atid perishable forms, the undeveloped
principle and the developed forms. The soul is power¬
less, and is in bondage that it may receive the recom¬
pense .of its works; but when it 'comes to know the
. divine Self it is loosed from all its ties.
There are two things unborn without beginning, the
knowing deity and the unknowing soul, the powerful SSSiV
ddty and the powerless souL There is also the one^bto£i**
unborn genetrix without beginning, energising that thethiD®1'
migrating souls may have the. recompense of their
works. -Further there is the infinite Self that is mani¬
fested under every form, aid that does nothing and
 216 THE PHILOSOPHY

Oexf. viil suffers nothing. As soon as he finds but the nature ^.of
these three, the sage is one with all things, one with
Brahman.”
The soul and the world-evolving deity are alike
fictitious presentments, that take the place of Brahman,
the underlying verity. In tile vision of the perfect
theosophist, both his own particular soul and the uni¬
versal soul or deity within him fade and melt away
into tiie unity of the characterless Self. The soul is
individual, the deity within is universal, the soul within
all souls. The soul is powerless, the deity all-powerful.
The soul has little knowledge, the deity knows all
things. The soul is unsatisfied in its -desires, the deity
is satisfied in every desire. The soul is- in a single
body, the deity is present in every soul and every body.
’ The bouL migrates and suffers misery, the deity is ex¬
empt from migration, and lives in the perfect bliss that
the soul shares only at times in dreamless sleep. And
yet the differences between soul and soul axe fictitious;
they are all one-in the universal soul or deity; and the
differences between the'soul and the deity axe also ficti¬
tious ; they are both one in the unity of the impersonal
Self. All things are one, and their variety in semblance
is due to the operation of the inexplicable Prakriti or
■tanSuSd of gtowtinto ingenita, the handmaid of the Archi-
magus. The sage finds out the nature of these three,
the soul, the deity, and his illusive power; learns that
they are alike fictitious semblances; and enters into the
fulness of bliss beyond the veil of semblance. The
cessation1 for him of the opeiancy of the world-fiction
is his liberation from metempsychosis.
“•The perishable is Pradhana, the principium. The
immortal and imperishable is Hara. The one divine
being roles the perishable principium and the perishable
individual souls. There is often at last a cessation of
the cosmical illusion through meditation, upon the im-
1 Viham&x&nivritti,
 OF THE VPAmSHADS. 217

perishable Self, through union, with it and entrance chap. Ym

into its being.
“On knowing the divine being there is a falling away Meditation
of all ties. As soon as the infirmities are put away t£?to the'1*'
there is an escape from births and deaths. A third Brahma,1 and
state arises from meditation on the deity as soon as the irommetem?
body is left behind—the state of universal lordship. r®r<!ho*18-
The sage that after this state reaches a state of isolation,
has all that is to be desired.”
The theosophist can, if he will, ascend after death to
the paradise of the supreme divinity, the Brahmalbka.
This paradise, in which he is to possess everything that
he can desire, lasts only till the close of the seon in
which he ascends into it. He must, therefore, when he
is exalted there, complete the process of extricating-
himself from metempsychosis by the knowledge of
Brahman. This is the only final rest and satisfaction
of the souL
“This Self is to be known as everlasting, as abiding
in itself, for there is nothing beyond the Self that can
be known. The migrating souls, their environment, and
the deity that actuates them from within,—these three
are revealed to be the Self.
“The Self is to be made to shine forth in the body Therapetitioe
by repetition of the mystic Om; in the same way as fire SnawSXm*
is unseen so long as it. is latent in the fire-drills, and so
long as its latency is not put an end to, and is seen tLTfire Stent
as often as it is struck out of the fire-drills that it
resides in.
“ Let the sage make his body the nether, and the
mystic syllable the upper fire-drill; and hy the pro¬
longed friction of meditation let him gaze upon the
divine Self that is concealed within him.
“ This Self is to be found within himself by the sage
that seeks it with truthfulness and with self-coercion;
like the oil that is in the oil-seeds, the hutter within
the cream, the water within the rivers.
 2i8 TH& philosophy

guaf. yiii: “'He finds the Self that permeates all things, the
“ fount of spiritual insight and of self-coercion, within
his body, as the curds are within the milk. ' That is
the Self in'which the fulness of bliss resides/’
The next section opens with a prayer that Savitri;
the‘sun-god, may irradiate the faculties of the asnirant,
second sec- II. “ May Savitri, fixing first my inward sense and
tionof to©00*’ then my senses, that I may attain to the truth, provide
the&spi:rant for me the light of Agni' and' lift me up above the
about to prac- ;i'
time Yoga.' earth.
“We strive with all our might, with concentrated
mind, and by the grace of Savitri, to attain to blessed¬
ness.
“ Fixing the senses with .the* inward sense, may
Savitri produce in us senses by which there shall be
bliss, and which shall reveal the divine being, the great
light, by spiritual intuition.
“Let the sages that fix the inner sense and the
senses, give great praise to the great, wise Savitri, who
alone, knowing all knowledge, appointed sacrificial
rites.
“ I meditate with adorations on that primeval Self
that ye reveal. My verses go along their course like
suns; and all the sons of the immortal who dwell in
celestial mansions hear them.”
After this invocation to the sun-god and the other
gods that preside over the various faculties of the mind
and tody, the sage is supposed to offer a libation of
Soma to Savitri.
“The mind is fixed upon the rite, the fire is struck
out, the a»4s Stirred, and the Soma-juice flows over.
“ Let the sage worship the primeval Self with a
libation of Soma to Savitri, 0 thou that wilt perfocm
ecstatic meditation upon the Self; for thy former rites
■no longer hind thee to metempsychosis.”
His former works and sacrifices will no longer affect
the aspirant to liberation; they will he bunit up like .a
 OF THE UPANISHADS. *19

bundle of rfcecls'iri the fire of spiritual knowledge. His.CHAp. v111.

libation to Savitri is a final rite for the purification of
his mind before entering upon the practice of Toga,
the rules for which are next prescribed. The aspirant
is to fix his body and limbs in a rigid and insensible
posture, and to crush every thought and feeling, that
he may rise to the ecstatic vision of the Self, the light,
within the heart.
“Fixing his body immovably with the three upper Fixation of
portions erect,1 and fixing his senses with the inward
sense upon the heart, let the sage cross over all the
fear-bringing streams of metempsychosis in the spiri-^S?01
tual boat, the mystic Om.
“ He must check his breath, and stop .every move¬
ment, and breathe only through the nose, with his
inward sepse repressed; he must with unfailing heed
hold fast the inward sense, a chariot with vicious
horses.
- Let him pursue the ecstatic vision in a level spot
free from fire, from pebbles and from sand, amidst
sweet sounds, and water, and leafy bowers, in a place
that soothes the mind and does not pain the eyes.
“First a frost, then a smoke, then the sun, then asignscfth*
fire, then a hot wirid, then a swann of fireflies, then
lightning, then a crystal moon,—such are the shapes vi*ion*
that precede and usher in the manifestation of the Self
in the ecstatic vision.
“When the fivefold nature of Yoga has been re¬
alised,2 when the earth, water, light, fire, and ether
have arisen, there is no further sickness, decay, or pain,
for him that has won a body purified in the fire of
ecstasy.
" Lightness, healthiness, freedom from desires, clear¬
ness of complexion, a pleasant accent in speaking, a
1 The chest, the neck, and the beyond the consciousness of the
head. properties of the five elements, in
3 Apparently this means, when his process of abstraction,
the sage has passed through and
 %20 THE PHILOSOPHY

XSfiS. Yin. pure odour, and diminution in the excretions, announce

the first success in Yoga.
“As an earth-stained disk of metal is bright and
shines as soon as it is cleaned, the embodied soul that
has gazed upon the spiritual reality has reached its end,
and its miseries are left behind.
soon as visionary sage has seen the spiritual
l5aoSySe& reality his own soul as a lamp to light him, he
tb»t p«r-
TWfWtOI and
knows the divine Self that is not bom and never fails.*
aaiinttaK.UM untouched by all the emanations; and he is loosed from
every tie.
. “Tor this divine Self is towards every quarter; it is
the first that passes into being. This it is that is in
the womb; this is that which is born and that which
shall be born. It stands behind all living things; it
has faces everywhere.
"The deity that is in fire and in the waters, that
permeates all the worlds, that is in plants and trees,—
to that deity be adoration, adoration.”
The third section treats of the first emanation from
Brahman, the 13 vara, Demiurgus, or world-evolving
deity, in language similar to that of the Purushasukta.
IIL "There is one deity that holds the net,1 who
ru^es his powers, who rules all the spheres with
l?iwitthe k*8 powers, who is oue and only one in the origination
.oomi« Booi. and manifestation of the world. They that know this
become immortal.
“ For there is only one Eudra, sages allow no second
thing, who rules these spheres with his powers. He
stands behind and within all living things; and after
he has projected and sustained the spheres, he retracts
them into himself at the close of the aeon.
"He has eyes everywhere, faces everywhere, arms
everywhere, feet everywhere. He incloses all things
with his arms, his wings; he is the one deity that gives
birth to sky and earth.
1 co&nacal illusion in winch migrating goals are ensnared
 OF THE VPAN1SHADS. 32*

He is the origin of the gods, the divine power of Qu?. ytel

the gods, the lord of all things, Budra, the great seer, *“
he that in the beginning begot Hiranyagarbha. May
he endow us with a lucid mind,
u 0 Budra, who dwellest in the mountains, look down
upon us, not in thy fearful aspect, but with that form
of thine that is auspicious, that reveals holiness, that is
most blessed,
* Thou that dwellest in the mountains, protector of
the mountains, make propitious that dart thou holdest in
thy hand to throw. Hurt not man, nor hurt the world,
“ There is an infinite Self that is beyond this world,
the Self that is hidden in the several bodies of all
things living, and that encompasses the world, the lord
of all; and they that know this Self become immortal
“ I know this great Purusha, sun-bright, beyond the
darkness. He that knows it passes beyond death.
There is no other path to go by.
“ Beyond this is nothing. There is nothing lesser,
nothing greater, than this. It stands fast in the
heavens like a tree, immovable. All the world is filled
with that Self, that Purusha,
“That which is beyond this world is colourless, is
painless. They that know this Self become immortal,
and others go again to misery.
“ All faces, all heads, all necks are its faces, heads,
and necks. It abides in the heart of every living thing.
That deity permeates all things, and is evervwhere and
in perfect bliss.
“ Purusha, the deity that actuates the mind from
within, is & great lord. He has in his power the re¬
covery of the purity of the soul, he is luminous and
imperishable.
** Purusha is of the size of a thumb. It is the Self
within, ever lodged within the hearts of living things,
ruling the thoughts in the heart, manifested in the
inward sense. They that know this become immortal
 azz THE PHILOSOPHY

Ofux. vra. “ Parasha has a thousand heads,-a thousand eyes, a

thousand feet. He compasses the earth on every side,
and stands ten fingers’ breadth beyond.
“ Purusha is all this; he is that which has been and
that which is to be, the lord of immortality, and the
lord of that which grows up by food.
“He everywhere has hands and feet, everywhere
eyes and heads and faces, everywhere he has ears. He
dwells in the body and permeates it alL”
It is not always easy to mark the transitions in this
fjpanishad from Brahman per se to Hvara or Brahman
as manifested in the world, from the impersonal Puru¬
sha to the divine Purusha or Arehimagus. The trans¬
lation here offered to the reader follows the intimations
of the scholiast {Wkaracharya. Wherever Purusha is
spoken of as a person we are to understand Ifvara.
n-..tv._-- “ It has no organs, but manifests itself in every mode
of every organ and faculty. It is the lord, the ruler of
Br*hman- the world, the great refuge of the universe.
“The.Self becoming the migrating soul moves out¬
wards to the perception of external things. It is the
actuator of all the world, of things that move, and
things that move not.
“It has neither hands nor feet, but moves rapidly
and handles all things. It sees without eyes, and hears
without ears. It knows all that is to be known, and
there is none that knows it. This, they say, is the
great primeval Purusha.
“The Self seated in’the hearts of living things, is
lesser than the least and greater than the greatest.
He that by the favour of the creating deity1 Sees this
undesiring Self, this mightiness, this lord, has' left all
miseries behind.
“"I know. this Self of all souls, unchanging, from
1 Dk&uh praaadat may be the Demiurgus; or “by the
translated either as in the text, purity of bis senses,” the senses of
“by the favour of the creating the visionary sage being pure as
deity,” that is, by the favour " of withdrawn from external things.
 OP THE UfANISHADS. 22$

before all time, present everywhere, and everywhere Ciur. viil

diffused, which the expositors of Brahman declare to
have had no genesis, and which they say shall have no
end.
“IV. That divine being, one only, of no race or Fourth see-
colour feigns a purpose and evolves a variety of races “*
in virtue of the variety of his powers, and withdraws
them into himself at the end of the aeon. The world
is in him in the beginning. May he endow us with a
lucid mind.
“That Self only is fire; it is the sun, it is the wind, it Themi™™.
is the moon, it is the stars, it is Hiranyagarbha, it is maoUestsuos
. . . . ** ° of Brahman
the waters, it is PrajapatL
"Thou art male and thou art female; thou art youth
and thovi art maiden; thou art decrepit and totterest
along with a staff; thou comest to the birth; thou hast
faces everywhere.
“ Thou art the dark bee, thou the red-eyed parrot;
thou art the thunder-cloud, thou the seasons, thou the
seas. Thou art without beginning, thou pervadest all
things; from thee proceed all the worlds.
“ There is one unborn being,1 red, white, and black,
that gives birth to many offspring like herself. One
’unborn soul lingers in dalliance with her, another
leaves her, his dalliance with her ended.
Two birds,8 always together and united, nestle upon Allegory or
, o * * ? , thetwobird*
the same tree;3 one .of them eats the sweet fruit of the on one tree,
holy fig-tree, and the other looks on witliout.eating.
“ In the same tree the migrating soul is immersed,
and sorrows in its helpless plight, and knows not what
to do; but its sorrow passes as soon as it sees the adored
lord, and that this world is only his glory.
'‘That Self is the supreme expanse that passes not
away; in it are the Richas, the hymns of praise; in it

1 The world-fiction, M5y3L or and the universal soul, Demiurgus

FrakptL See above, p. 203. or tavara. See above, p. 108.
* The micrmtinfr soul or Jiva. 3 The body.
 324 THE PHILOSOPHY

nwiP vm. dwell all the gods. What shall he that knows not this
~ do with hymns of praise? They that know it, they
are sped.
“ That Self is proclaimed by the hymns, the sacri¬
fices, rites, and ordinances, by the past and by the
future, and by the Vedas. It is out of this Self that
the arch-illusionist projects this world, and it is in that
Self that the migrating soul remains entangled in the
illusion."
The Self is veiled beneath illusion, and with illusion
as a fictitious counterpart or body,1 manifests itself iu
its first emanation as Ilvara, the Archimagus, or world-
projecting deity. The Self is. in and by itself the un¬
conditioned, but in virtue of the self-feigning world-
fiction, the principle of unreality that has co-existed
with it from everlasting, it presents itself as the ficti¬
tious creator of a fictitious world,
pntkritus “ Let the sage know that Prakriti is Maya, and that
x^vusjathe Mahe6vara2 is the Mayin or arch-illusionist. All this
sionjst?11' shifting world is filled with portions of him.
“He alone presides over emanation after emanation;
the world is in him, and he withdraws the world into
himself. He that knows that adorable deity, the giv^r
of the good gift of liberation, passes into this peace for
ever.
“ He is the origin and the exaltation of the gods, the
ruler over all, the great seer Budra. See how he passes
into fresh manifestation as Hiranyagarbha. May he
endow us with a lucid mind.
“ He is lord over all the gods; upon him the worlds
are founded; he rules all living things, two-footed or
four-footed. Let us offer an oblation to the divine
Ka*
“He is more supersensible than the supersensible;
he dwells in the midst of the chaos of illusion, the
multiform creator of the universe, the one soul that
1 TJpadhi * ISvara, Badra, Han, or &Ta, * PrajSpati.
 OF THE VPANISHADS. 22$

encircles all things. He that knows this 6iva passes Chap, yiil
into peace for ever.
“ He is the upholder of the world throughout the
seon, the lord of all. hidden within all living things.
Holy sages and gods have risen to union with him.
They that know him cut the cords of death.
“He is hidden in all living things, like the filmy
scum upon ghee, the one divine soul that encompasses
the world. He that knows this $iva is extricated from
all bonds.
“This divine being, the maker of the world, the uni- is'™*, the
versal soul, is ever seated in the hearts of living things, SpreseStil*
and is revealed by the heart, the intellect, the thought.mry
They that know this become immortaL”
The universal soul, or maker of the world, is present
in the ether in the heart of every living creature, mir¬
rored upon its mind, as the sun is reflected upon an
infinite variety of watery surfaces. He is revealed in
the thotght that all things are one; in the vision in
which all things lose their differences and melt away
into their original unity. The semblances of duality
and of plurality iu the waking and the dreaming states
are illusory. The soul rises above them into the pure
bliss of dreamless sleep and of meditative union with
I5vara. He is to rise above this union with l&vara to
the vision of the characterless Self. The three states
of the soul are the darkness of the world, through which
the theosbphist is to rise into the light of spiritual
intuition.
* When there is no darkness, there is neither night
nor day. There is neither existence nor non-existence, jagfet
but pure and blissful being only. That is imperishable,
that is adorable even to the sun-god himself, and from SS2SS««.
it proceeds the eternal wisdom.
“ No man has grasped this, above, below, or in the
midst There is no image of this, and its name is the
infinite glory.
 226 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. viii. “His form is present in no visible spot, and no man

~ sees him with the eye. They that know him thus with
heart and mind become immortal.
invooitioBof ‘'Now and then a sage, in fear of the-miseries of
nttax* lor aid . ^
inmaditAtuu. metempsychosis, turns towards him because he is witbr
out beginning. 0 Rudra, save me for ever with thy
right, thy gracious, countenance.
“ Harm us not in child or grandchild, or in cattle Oi
in horses, nor slay our servants in thy anger. We
have the sacrificial butter, and invoke thee at our holy
assembly.
run Section « y. Knowledge and illusion, these two, are laid up
JdMueton. and hidden in the imperishable and infinite Self above,
and in it are as yet unmanifested. Illusion passes, but
knowledge is undying. He that dispenses knowledge
and illusion is other than they.
“ There is one being who actuates phase after phase
of being from within, all colours, and all emanations.
He fosters with knowledge the Rishi Kapila, that arose
in the beginning, and beheld him coming into being.”
Kapiia, tie This being is the immortal internal ruler, the uni-
versal soul, or Ilvara, The colours referred to are the
red colour of fire, the white colour of water, and the
1'iudedVu the

' uJwShHd1^ black colour of earth, as in the fourth Khanda of the

X^Sta,h*’ sixth Prapathaka of the Chhandogya. Sankaracharya
Ec'work^11 explains that Kapila is either a metonym for the golden*
hued Hiranyagarbha, the divine being that emanates
out of Kvaxa, ot the Rishi Kapila, the founder of the
Sankliya philosophy. In the Bhagavadgita (x. 26),
Krishna, in that poem identified with the Demiurgus,
says, * Among perfect sages I am the Muni Kapila.”
Kapila is not in this place identified with Hiranya¬
garbha by either Sankaracharya or by S ildharasvamin,
the chief scholiasts of the Bhagavadgita; nor do they
attempt to explain the eulogy of the founder of the
Sankhya philosophy in this purely Vedantic work.
In the second chapter of the Bhagavadgita (ii. 39)
 OF THE VPANISHADS. 227

va read: “ This view has been proclaimed to thee Ohis. vnt

according to the Sankhya doctrine.” Here Sankara-
charva and Sridharasvamin interpret Sankhya by
“spiritual reality,” the object of Sankhya, i.t., the
spiritual intuition or ecstatic vision of the fontal
essence. They would therefore construe the text:
“This view as regards the Self or spiritual reality
has been explained to thee.” In the third verse of
the third chapter Krishna says, “I revealed in the
beginning of the world that there are two modes of
life, that of the Sankhyas in the pursuit of knowledge,
and that of the Yogins in the observance of sacred
rites.” Sankaracharya and Srldharasvamin say that
the Sankhyas of this passage are the theosophists
versed in the teaching of the TTpanishads and intent
upon the ecstatic vision of the Self; and that the
Yogins. aTe those that follow the immemorial ordi¬
nances with a view to the preliminary purification to
the inind. Again in the fourth verse of the fifth
chapter Krishna says, “ It is the foolish, not the wise,
that say the Sankhya and the Yoga differ.” Here
again Sankaraeharya and Siidharasvamin explain the
Sankhyas to be the sages that have renounced all
things in quest of the knowledge that leads to extri¬
cation-, and the Yogins to be those that follow the
prescriptive sacra in order to purify their minds for
that quest. In the twenty-fourth verse of the thir¬
teenth chapter Krishna says, “ Some gaze upon the
Self by meditative ecstasy, some see the Self by the
mind purified with meditation, others by fSnkhya
meditation, and others by Karmayoga.” Sankaracharya
and Siidharasvamin in this place take the term San¬
khya to mean the philosophy of the Sankhyas, the
recognition of the differences between Prakriti, or the
three primordia rerum, and Purusha; but they cer¬
tainly intend Prakriti and Purusha to be taken in the
Vedantic sense, as precise equivalents of Maya and
 228 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chat. viii. Brahman. Karmayoga they explain, as before, to be

— the following of the prescriptive pieties; The teaching
of the Bhaga-vadglta is throughout the same as that
of the TTpanishads; and the only explanation of the
references to Kapila and the Sankhya philosophy in
this poein, as also in the {§veta£vatara TJpanishad, would
seem to be that the Sankhya was originally a more
precise set of terms for the enumeration of the emana
tions out of Prakriti or Maya, and of the differences
between Maya and Purusha or Brahman. The divert
gence of hraseology must subsequently have led to a
divergence of views; and thus the Sankhya philosophy
formulised itself, with its repudiation of l£vara, and its
position of the reality and independence of Prakriti, of
the reality of the duality and plurality of the world of
experience, and of the plurality of Purusha? or Selves.
To return to the text of the &veta6vatara tTpanishad.
is'nrujmads “ This one deity spreads out his net in many modes
tempqrcboair for every one in this .field of illusion, and draws it in
SiSuton?* again. Thus the great lord again and again evolves the
Prajapatis, and exercises dominion over all things.
“ He shines like the sun, irradiating all spaces above,
below, between. Thus this potent and adorable deity
alone presides over the various origins of things.
“ He is the origin of the world; he ripens the nature
of each thing, and develops all things that can be
developed. He alone presides over this universe, and
variously disposes the primordia.
“ That Self is hidden in the Upanishads, which are
hidden in the Vedas. That Brahma (Hiranyagarbha)
knows to -be the source of the Veda. The gods and
Bishis that of old have known that Self, have become
one with it, have become immortal”
The text now proceeds to speak of the various forms
of life in which the one and only Self illusively presents
itself.
" This-is followed from life to life by the influence of
 OF THE UPAN1SHADS. «9

former works; this is the doer of works that shall he Chap, vm

recompensed; and this is the soul that has the recom-
pense of that which it has done. This in all the variety
of its forms migrates from body to body according
to its works, associated with the three primordia,
travelling along three paths,1 the ruler of the vital
airs.
“ It is of the size of a thumb, yet splendid as the
sun. It takes to itself volition and personality, to¬
gether with the mental modes and the functions of the
body. In its individual ‘manifestation it is seen to be
of the size of the point of a goad.
“ The living soul is to be known as the fraction of the
point of a hair a hundred times divided, and at the
same time it is of infinite extension.
" It is neither male, nor female, nor sexless. It is
preserved in every various body that it assumes.
“The embodied soul, desiring, touching, seeing,
iliuded, passes into form after form, in sphere after
sphere of recompense, in accordance with its works;
even as the body has a continuous growth by the
assimilation of food and drink.
"The embodied soul invests a variety of bodies
supersensible and sensible with the lasting influence
of its works in earlier embodiments; and, according to
the nature of its works and the nature of its bodies, is
united with some fresh body, and seems to be another.
“ The deity is without beginning and without end;
in the midst of the illusion; the creator of thei world,
manifold in its manifestations; the only spirit that en¬
compasses the universe. He that knows him is loosed
from every tie.
' They free themselves from the body who know the
divine being that is cognisable to the purified mind;
that has no -body, that makes things fo be and not to
1 The path of dharma or religion, the path of adhamm or irreligion
end the path of ji&na or spiritual knowledge.
 230 THE PHILOSOPHY

Our. m be; free from the cosinical illusion; the maker of tjie
elements of the organism.
sixth section. “YL Some sages say that the nature of things is
an exhibition the originating principle, others that it is -time. This
of thSfte. they say in their confusion, but it is the glory of the
UI*tt8, deity that keeps the wheel of Brahman, the ccsmio
cycle, still revolving.
“ It is the all-knowing author of time, all-perfect, by
whom this world is eternally pervaded. The retri¬
butive fatality is set in motion by him to produce
form after form of spurious being, to be viewed as
earth, water, fire, air, and ether.
“He makes that work and pauses; and again and
again brings the underlying spiritual reality into union
with some emanation, with one, or two, or three, or
eight emanations, and into union with time and with
the invisible,functions of the mind/*
The eight emanations of Prakriti or Maya here* re¬
ferred to are earth, water, fire, air, ether, the common
sensory, personality, and mind.
u If the sage resolves all these emanations, together
with the three prmor&ia and also ajl his menial modes,
into I$vara the creative deity, these things cease to
exist for him, and he puts away his good and evil
works. As soon as his works are annulled, he passes
forward, separate from those emanations.
u But before this he must have meditated upon the
adorable deity that is present in his mind, and mani¬
fests itself in every various form, the essence of all
that is. This deity is the origin of all things, the
source of the illusions that give rise to the successive
embodiments of the soul; beyond the present, past, and
future, unlimited by time.
* That deity is beyond the appearances of the world-
tree and the presentments of time; and this manifested,
world proceeds out of him in its revolutions. He
that knows this lord of glory, that'brings righteousness
 OF THU UPANISHADS. 231
apd puts a,way all imperfections, within his mind, im- Char vm. ,
mortal, the substance of the universe,—passes beyond ' '
metempsychosis.
"We know that deity to be the god above all gods,
the lord above all lords, beyond the world-fiction, the
adorable ruler of the spheres of recompense.
" He has no body and no organs, and none is equal
to him. or greater than he. His various power is
revealed to be above all things, and this power is his
essence, an energy of knowledge and of action.
"There is no lord or ruler over him in this world, no
mark of his existence. He is the origin of all things.
He is the lord above the deities that preside over the
organs of sense and motion. There is none that begets
him, and none that is lord above him.
"This deity, essentially one, is like a spider, and covers w«ta the
himself with threads drawn from Pradhana. May he divmeRi*ider’
grant us a passage back into the Self.
"He is the one deity veiled in every living thing, the
soul that is in every souL He permeates eveiy form
of life, recompensing the works of every creature, and
making his habitation in them, as the witness within,
the light within, isolated, apart from the primordia.
"He is the one being that energises freely in the many
migrating souls that energise not at alL It is he that
develops the germ of things into its variety of forms.
Everlasting bliss is foT those sages that see this deity in
their own minds, within themselves, and for* none be¬
sides.”
The migrating souls are themselves inert. Their
bodies and their senses act, but they do not act, and the
actions of their bodies and their senses are produced by
the Demiurgus. There is no individual liberty of action.
Their bodies are mere puppets, and the Demiurgus
pulls the strings. It is he that produces in them their
good and evil works, and it is he that rewards and
punishes the works that he has wrought in them. All
 232 THE PHILOSOPHY

Oha*. vttt that they seem to see and do and suffer, is the jugglery
of this arch-illusionist.
“ He is eternal in the eternal souls, conscious in the
conscious souls; he is the one soul that metes out veal
and voe to many souls. He that knows this deity, the
principle of emanation to be learned in the Sankhya.and
the Toga, is loosed from every tie.
The Saif bthe “ The sun gives no light to that, nor the moon and
TOii£au’ stars, neither do these lightnings light it up; how then
should this fire of ours ? All things shine after it as it
shines; all this world is radiant with its light.
“This is the one soul in the midst of this world.
This is the fire that is seated in the midst of the water.
He that knows this Self passes beyond death, and there
is no other path to go by.”
The Self is a fire, for it hums up the world-fiction and
its figments in the purified mind of the theosophist in
ecstatic union with it. It is seated in the midst of the
water, in the bodies of all living things, which emanate
out of the world-fiction, one of the names of which is
water, the “ undifierenced water” of the Nasadlyasukta.
“He is the maker of all things, and he knows all
things. He is the soul of all and the source of all, the
perfect and omniscient author of time. He is the sus-
tainer of Pradhana,the principium, and of the' migrating
souls; the disposer of the primordia, and the origin of
metempsychosis and of liberation, of the preservation
of the world and the implication of the soul.
“Such is the immortal Demiurgus, residing in the
soul, knowing all things, and present everywhere; the
sustainer .of the world, who rules over the world for ever.
There is no other principle that is able to rule over it.
“Aspiring to extrication, I fly for refuge to that
divine soul that is the light within the mind; who at
the beginning of an aeon evolves Hiranyagarbha out of
himself, and evolves the Vedas.
“ The Self is without parts, without action, and with-
 OF THE VPANISRADS. ■ 233

oat change; blameless and unsullied; the bridge that Gear vm.
leads to immortality; a fiercely burning fire. *
“ When men shall roll np the sky like a hide, then only know,
and not till then shall there be an end to misery with- itemST*"
out knowing the divine Self. npatedUT*
“&ret84vatara, the sage, throngh the efficacy of his
austerities and throngh grace to know the Yedas, re*
vealed to the recluses the high, pure Brahman that has
been rightly meditated upon by many Rishis.
“ This highest mystery of the Upanishads, revealed in
a former age, is not to be imparted to any man who is
not a quietist, a son, or a disciple.
“ If he has unfeigned devotion to the deity, and to
his spiritual teacher as to the deity, these truths thus
proclaimed reveal themselves to the excellent aspirant
They reveal themselves to that excellent aspirant”
Such is the Svetaivatara Upanishad. The reader
will have seen that it teaches the same doctrine as the
Uther Upanishads. Archer Butler is an admirable in¬
terpreter of the imperfect materials before him when
- he writes: “ TI16 cultivators of practical wisdom in¬
cessantly labour for the possession of a supernatural
elevation. Prolonged, attitudes, endurance of suffering,
pnbroken meditations upon the (Urine nature, accom¬
panied and animated by the frequent and solemn repeti¬
tion of the mystical name Om, are the means by which
the Yogin, for perhaps three thousand years, has sought
the attainment bf'an ecstatic participation of God;1
and, half-deceiver, half-deceived, affects to have already
soared beyond earthly limitations, and achieved hyper¬
physical power. Towards the complete consummation of
this final liberation, the Yedas * proclaim that there are
three degrees, two preliminary,—the possession of trans¬
cendent power in this life, that is, of magical endow¬
ments, and the passage after death into the conrts of
Brahma,—which are only precursory to that last and
.l Rather of the divine Self. * The Upanishad#.
 234 THE PEtLVSOPHY

Chap.tHL glorious reunion with tlie First Cause himself,1 which

terminates all the changes of life in an identification
with the very principle of eternity and of repose.
Upon the mild sages of the Ganges these views probably
produce little result beyond the occasional suggestion
of elevated ideas, perhaps more , than counterbalanced
by the associations of a minute and profitless super¬
stition. But upon the enormous mass of the nation
these baseless dreams can only result in the perpetua¬
tion of ignorance and tbe encouragement of imposture:
to both of which they manifestly and directly tend,—
to the former, by being unfitted for the vulgar mind; to
the latter, by countenancing pretences to supernatural
power,”
1 Bather the first cause itself.
 OF THE VPANISHADS . *35

CHAPTER IX.
THE PRIMITIVE ANTIQUITY OF THE DOCTRINE OP
MAYA.

“ And, like the baseless fabric of a vision.

The clond-capp’d towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve;
And, like an insubstantial pageant faded.
Leave nob a wrack behind. We are such stuff
dreams are made of, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep.**—Shaeweabx.
“.The sensible world must.be called, as we have properly called it, and
1 Mato certainly meant to call, and sometimes did caff it, the non-
nsioal world, the world of pure infatuation, of downright contradic-
on, of unalloyed absurdity; and this the whole material universe is,
hen divorced from the element which makes it Aknowable an&bbgit-
>le thing. Take away from the intelligible world,—that is, from the
*twn of things by which we are surrounded,—the essential element
hick enables ns, and all intelligence, to know and apprehend it, and
most lapse into utter and inutter&ble absurdity. It beoomes more
lan nothing yet less than anything.*’—Psbbisb.

XT us recall to our mind tlie Vogin as the Upanishads Chap. IX.

ave pictured him to us. seated in a posture of bodv ThawoUdb.
igid and insensible, with his feelings crashed and his tiwrtnroctiM
noughts suppressed. His senses are withdrawn from
ie sensible things around him; his inward sense is
xed upon a single point; and he is intent upon reach-
ig the pure iudetermiuation of thought, the character-
)8S being, that is the last residue of abstraction pushed
3 its furthest , limit. In the progress of his ecstatic-
recitation, first his body and his visible and palpable
nvironment fade away, recede, and disappear ;he passes
 23<* THE PHILOSOPHY

ait. EC. into the vesture of the airs of life; he is conscious no

longer of his surroundings and of his organism, but only
of the vital functions. He has passed .beyond the body
into the tenuous imolmnm of his soul JHis vesture
of the airs of life fades away, recedes, and disappears
into his Vesture of inward Sense; he is no longer con¬
scious of the vital functions, but only of the imagery
.within that simulates the things of sense. His vesture
of inward sense fades away, recedes, and disappears
into his mental vesture; he is no longer conscious of the
simulative imagery, but only of his mental life. And
poil his tenuous imoluenm begins to melt away.. Hit
mental vesture fades away, recedes, and vanishes into
the vesture of characterless bliss; be is no longer con¬
scious of his mental life, bat only of the surcease jto'f
every fear and care and sorrow, for his individuality is
fast dissolving. Last of all, his vesture cf character¬
less bliss fades away, recedes, and vanishes, and the
light of fontal Jbeing, thought, and bliss alone reinains.
This light- is unwavering .and. unfailing. The whole
world is a dissolving view that fines into paler and paler
aspects, and finally disappears; the’light it shone in
is' atm there, the light of the underlying Self, in the
absence of which the world would lapse into hlindneaa,
darkness, nothingness. The ecstatic vision is the dawn
before which the darkness of the figments of the world?
flebjpn rolls away, and the Self rises more bright atsd
glorious than the sun. The sage leaves the sorrows of
his heart behind him, reaches the point where feari&ao
more, and is, one with the light of .lights beyond the
darkness of the world-fiction. He 4 in the body, bat
is no longer touched by the good and evil that he does,
but “ free as the casing jut.” • At last h4 body feus
away from him, the feverish dream of life after life 4
over, and he 4 extricated from metempsychosis. H4
soul has returned into the Self, as water into water,
light into light, ether into the ether thatis everywhere.
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 237

It has been often said that the doctrine that the in- ceap. el
dividual soul and the world have only a dream-like and The«urent
illusive existence, is no part of the primitive philosophy tSdoS^of
of the Upamshads, but a later addition of the Vedantins,
the modem representatives of that philosophy. This
is abatement that has been iterated by Orientalisttau»uf
after Orientalist from the time of Colebrooke to the pre¬
sent day. The doctrine of Maya, or the unreality of
the'duality, of subject and object, and the unreality of
the plurality of souls and their environments, is the
very life of the primitive Indian philosophy; and it |s
necessary to prove that Oolebrooke was mistaken in
denying its primitive antiquity, and to point out the
source of his error. It is the purpose of this chapter,
therefore, to prove that the unreality of the world, as an
emanation^of the self-feigning world-fiction, is part and
parcel of the philosophy of the Upanishads. The great
Vedantic doctor, Sankaraeharya, was right in holding
it foi such, and his philosophy is the philosophy of the
Upanishads themselves, only in sharper outlines and in
fresher colours. The Vedanta has a just title to be styled,
as it is styled, the Aupanishadl Mlmansa.
In his esSay on the Vedanta, read before a meeting of
the Boyal Asiatic Society in 1827, Coiebrooke said:
“The notion that the versatile world is an illusion
(Maya), and that all that passes to the apprehension of
the waking individual is but a phantasy presented to
hiff imagination, and every seeming thing is unreal and
all is visionary, does not appear to he the doctrine of
the 'text of the Vfedanta. I have remarked nothing
which countenances it in the SutraS of Vyasa or in the
of 'Sankara, butmiieh concerning it in the minor
c mmentaries and elementary treatises. I take it to be
no tenet of the original VediLntin philosophy, bat of an¬
other branch, from which later writers have borrowed it,
and have intermixed and confounded the two systems.
The doctrine of the early Vedanta is complete and consis-
 238 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. K. tent without this graft of a later growth.” A statement

" false from first to last.
SgmaftVtbs ^ mus* be already clear enough to an attentive
reader of tlie foregoing chapters of this work, that the
utmiooncep- unreality of migrating souls and the spheres they
migrate through, and the sole reality of the impergonal
Self, is the very cosmic conception of the Upanisbads.
Any assertion, however, of Colebrooke carries with is
so much weight, and his present assertion has been so
often repeated by later Orientalists, that this denial of
the primitive antiquity of the tenet of Maya must be
refuted vn> extern). The denial throws darkness over
the whole progressive series of Indian cosmologies, and.
must be put aside in order to secure the first step
of the historical exposition. The picture of things pre¬
sented in the Upanishads is the primitive Indian
philosophy, the starting-point for any critical treatment
of the successive systems. It is the basis on which
any future historian of Indian philosophy will have to
build.
Motel*- Part of Colebrooke's assertion is untrue on the face
mrtiiVgia£ of it He says that he finds nothing in the gloss of
<a**nr‘ Sankara to countenance the doctrine that the world is
an illusion. This part of his statement has already re¬
ceived its correction at the hands of Professor CowelL1
“ This is hardly correct as regards Sankara, since in his
commentary on the Vedanta aphorisms (ii. 1. 9), he ex¬
pressly mentions the doctrine of Maya as hold by the
teachers of the Vedanta, and he quotes a floka to that
-effect from ^Gaudapada's Karikas. Compare also his
language in" the opening of his commentary on the
second book. These is also a remarkable passage in his
commentary on the Aitareya Upaoishad, i. 2. It ma
be remarked (this passage says) that a carpenter can
make a house as he is possessed. of material, but how
. can the soul, being without material, create the world t
1 In a note in hie edition of Cokbrooke’i Essays, VdL i. p. 40a
 OF THE UPAMSHADS. 239
But there is nothing objectionable in this. The world Chap, jx
can exist in its material cause, that is, in the formless,
undeveloped subject which is'called soul (or Self), just
as the subsequently developed foam exists in water.
There is therefore nothing contradictory in supposing
that the omniscient Demiurgus, who is himself the
material cause of names and forms, creates the world.
Or better still, we may say that as a material juggler
without material creates himself as it were another self
going in the air, so the omniscient deity, being omni¬
scient and mighty in Maya, creates himself as it were
another self in the form of the world.” It is hard to
understand how Colebrooke could have made such a ■
mistake as regards the gloss of Sankara, Sankaracharya’s
commentary on the aphorisms of the Vedanta. A
cursory inspection of the gloss is enough to find the
tenet of illusion stated or supposed on every page. It
is often expressly taught, as shall be proved by copious . j
extracts.
The mistake is excusable enough as far as regards Th« eatr**«.
the text of the Vedanta or Sutras of Vyasa. In them- the vedant*
selves, and apart from the traditionary interpretation,
the Sutras or aphorisms are a minimum of memoria
technica, and nearly unintelligible. Nevertheless it
shall be shovm that the doctrine denoted by the term
Maya, if not the term itself, is to be found in the
Sutras. Colebrooke himself cannot have attached
much importance to what he supposed to be the nega¬
tive testimony of these aphorisms. He himself says:
“ The ^arlrakasutras1 are in the highest degree obscure,
and could never have been intelligible without an
ample interpretation. Hinting the question or its
sontion, rather than proposing the one or briefly
delivering the other, they but allude to the subject
Like the aphorisms of other Indian sciences, they must
from the first have been accompanied by the author’s
1 That is, the aphorisms of the Vedfinta.
1
34o THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap.IX. exposition of the meaning, whether orally taught by

him or communicated in writing.” This is most true,
and let it be noted that &ahkaracharya is the greatest
qf -the prescriptive expositors of the Sutras of the
Vedanta. The Indian systems were handed down in
a regular line of succession,11 an unbroken series of ex¬
ponents. They were to be learned only from an autho¬
rised expositor, a recognised successor of the primitive
teachers. iSankaracharya is in possession, with his
doctrine of illusion. The burden of proof lies with
those who assert that the tenet of Maya is an innova¬
tion on the primitive philosophy of the Upanishada
T«tutrftbe Before proving the'presence Of the doctrine of SfSya
tateh th« va- in the Sutras of Vyasa and the gloss of Sankaraoharva.
renfltyoftli© . • - ,, , . . . . „ ;
worfd. it will be well to point out again some of the primitive
texts in which that doctrine is enounced. The Vedanta
is only a systematic exposition of the philosophy of the
Upanishads. Sankaraeharya says that the Siitras of
the Vedanta are a string on which the gems cf the
Upanishads are strung. The word Vedanta is itself a
synonym^ of the word Upanishad, and the Vedanta
system is itself often styled the AnpanishadI
or philosophy of the Upanishads.
• Ascending perhaps higher than the Upanishads, we
ftSkkyma. find this doc trine present in the celebrated Nasadlya-
sukta, Bigveda x. 129. “It was not entity” says the
Bishi, “nor was it nonentity.”' Butting aside the
assertion of Golebrooke, which shall be shown to rest
only on the statement of an antagonist of (he Vedanta,
there is no reason to question Sayana’s interpretation
of this hymn. Sayapa's interpretation is the tradition¬
ary exposition, and is fonnd in other Indian philoso¬
phical books, as, for example, in Bamatlrtha's Paday -
janika or commentary on the UpadeiasahasrI of Son-
karacharya, and in the Atmapurapa. Sayepa tells ns
that the Nasadlyasukta describes the state of things
1 -imadyafiammparA, dckdiyaparaapard.
 of ms upanishads. *4*

between two sons, the state technically known as the cm*. ix.
prala#Lvasth&. An earlier world has been withdrawn
Into the world-fiction Maya, out of which it sprang,
and the later world is not yet proceeding into being;
In this state of dissolution, says Sayapa, the warId-
fiction, the principinm of the versatile world is not a
nonentity; it is not a piece of nonsense, a purely chi¬
merical thing, like the horns of a hare, for the world
eannot emanate oat of any each sheer absurdity. On
the other hand, it is not an entity, it is not. a reality
like the one and only Self. Maya, the principle here
spoken of, is neither nonentity nor entity, but something
inexplicable, a thing of which nothing can be intelli¬
gibly predicated. No nihilistic teaching is intended,
for it is said further ou in the same hymn, “ That one
breathed without afflation.” This one and only reality
is the characterless Self. Seal existence is denied not
of the impersonal Self, bat of Maya. Such is the tra¬
ditional interpretation of the first verse of the Nasadl-
yasukta. It is a natural interpretation, and if we, with
our thoughts fashioned for us by purely irrelevant ante¬
cedents, try to find another for ourselves, we are pretty
sure to invent a fiction. The Nasadlyasukta seems
then to be the earliest enouncement of the eternal
coexistence of a spiritual principle of reality-and an
nn&piritual principle of unreality.
It is presumably already plain enough that the
Upatushads teach the fictitious and unreal nature of
the world. The fictitious character of the world of
semblances is everywhere implied in the doctrine of
the sole existence of the impersonal Sell It is not
only implied, bat stated, in the following passages.
In the Brihadarapyaka Upanishad we read:—
"India (the Deminrgus) appears multiform by hisenmitati*
illusions (or fictions, or powers), for his horses are yoked,
hundreds and tea This Self is the horses (the senses),<kad>
this is the ten (organs of sense ahd -motion), this is the
<T
 *4a THE miWSOPHY

OBtf.ix. many thousands, the innumerable (migrating souls).

— This pfriuft Self has nothing before it or after it, nothing
inside it or outside it.”
In another text of the same Upanishad very fre¬
quently cited by the Indian schoolmen:—
“ What Self is .that ? asked the prince. The Bishi
said, It is this conscious soul amidst the vital airs, the
light within the heart. This Self, one and the same in
every uiind and every body, passes through this life
and the next life in the body, and seems to think, and
seems to move.”1
In another important passage of the same TJpapishad
the eternal objectless thought of the Self1 is contrasted
with the fleeting and evanescent cognitions of the soul
and the real existence of the Self with the quasi-exist¬
ence of everything else than Self. This passage is.—
“This same imperishable Self is that which sees
unseen, "hears unheard, thinks' unthought-upon, knows
unknown. There is no other than this that sees, n<
other this that hears, no other than this tha
tfrinVa, no other than this that knows. Oyer thi
vmpftriahfthlft principle the expanse is woven war]
and woof.
“As in dreamless sleep the soul sees, but sees no
this or that, so the Self in seeing sees not; for ther
is no intermission in the-sight of the Self that sees, it
vision is one th^t passes not away: and there is nothin
second to that, other than that, apart from that, tht
it should see.
“ As in dreamless sleep the soul hears, but hears n<
this or that, so the Self in hearing hears not; for thei
is no intermission in the hearing of the Self that hear
its audition is one that passes not away: and there
nothing second to that, other than that, apart fro
that, that it should hear.
“ As in dreamless sleep the soul thinks, hut thin'
* Dhy&yaffm Iclayativa. 9 Nityani nirvtikayaifl jndnam
 OF THE UIU NISH A DS. 243

ot this or that, so the Self in thinking thinks not; for Chap. ix.
there is' no intermission in the thonght of the Self that
thinks, its cogitation is one that passes not away .: and
there isjiothing second to that, other than that, apart
from'that, that it should think.
* As in dreamless sleep the sonl knows, but known
not this or that, so the Self in knowing knows not; for
there is no intermission in the knowing of the Self
that knows, its knowledge is one that passes not away:
and there is nothing second to that, other than that,
apart from that, that it should know.
“ Where in waking or in dreaming there is, as it were, oiJy
something else, .there one sees something else than draadtt
oneself. Smells something else, tastes something else,
speaks to something else, hears something else, thinks Selt
upon something else, touches something else, knows
something else.”
Mark the qualification “ as it were,” yaim v& *nyad
iva syat. We might also. translate, “ Where in waking
or in dreaming there seems to be something else.”
This allows only a quasi-existence, a fictitious presen-*
tation, to all that is other than the Self.
In another passage of the same Upanishad we read:
“ This same world was then undifferenced,1 It dif¬
ferenced itself under names and colours (that is, under
visible and nameable aspects); such a thing having such
a name, and such a thing having such a colour. There¬
fore, this world even now differences itself as to name
and colour; such a one having such a name, and such
a thing having such a colour. This same Self entered
into it, into the body, to the very finger-nails, as a
razor into a razor-case, or as- fire resides within the
fire-drills; Men see not that Sell That whole Self
breathing is called the breath, speaking it is called the
voice, seeing-it is called the eye, hearing it ’is called
the ear, thinking it is called the thought. These are
1 Prior to its erplotlon at the beginning; ®* an aeon-
 544 THE PHtLOSOPHY

Chap. ix. only names of its activity. If then a man thinks any
one of these to be the Self, he knows not; for the Self
is not wholly represented in any one of these. Let
Mm know that the Self is the Self, for aU things
become one in the Self.’1
um mm All things quit their name and colour, lose their
StrlSt” visible and nameable aspects, and pass away into the
characterless unity of the Self The principle of un-
reality that co-exists from all eternity with the prin¬
ciple of reality, .is most frequently named in the
Upanishads avyaktita, the undifferenced, uncharac¬
tered, or unevdved; and the process of the evolution,
emanation, or manifestation of things is generally
styled their differentiation under name and colour,
or presentation in various visible and nameable aspects,
namariijiavyakarana. The principle of unreality has
many other names in the Upanishads. It is the
expanse, Maya, Prakjiti, Sakti, darkness, illusion, the
shadow, nescience, falsity, the indeterminate.1
In another passage of the Bfihadaragyaka Upani-
ah&d we read:—
“ They that know the breath of the breath, the eye
of the eye, the ear of the ear, the thought of the
thought,—they have seen the primeval Self that .has
been from before all time.
“It is to be seen only with the mind: there is
nothing in it that is manifold.
“ From death to death he goes, who looks on this
as manifold.
“ It is to be seen in one way only, it i3 indemon¬
strable, immutable. The Self is unsullied, beyond the
expanse, unborn, infinite, imperishable.”
The expanse is the eosmical illusion. In another
passage of the Bjihadaranyaka Upanishad the seeming
1 AvyairUam, fiigJam, panana- anntam, atyaHam, jWkarSchiry*
vyema,, mSgt, prafyifif, ioitit, on SvetfiiiTatara Upanishad i 3.
tamo, ckiaya, 'jiinam.
 OF THE UPANISHADS. *45
uality of subject and object is spoken of as disap¬ Cttir.IX.
pearing in the all-embracing unity of the Sell
“Where there is as it were a duality (or, where Tho duality
•nbfoetana
there seems to be a duality), one sees another, one otriwtbaa
oxQjriqaaal-
smells another, one speaks to another, one thinks about -xiatvoo*.
another, one'knows another;, but where all this world
is' Self alone,’what should one smell another with, see
another, with, hear another with, speak to another with,
think about another with, know another with ? How
should a man know that which he knows all this world
with ? Wherewithal shoilld a man know the knower ? "
Mark again the qualification “at ft were,” patra
dvaitam iva bhavati. The duality of subject and object
is only quasi-existent, a .fictitious presentment
The unreality of the world is taught with no less The unreality
of tbeworidia
plainnes,0 in the following passage of the Chhandogya taught in the
Upanishad
nuuiy
“As everything made of day is known by a single art only "«
xaodifkatioo
lump of clay; being nothing more than a modification ofdpeeoh, m
change, a
of speech, a change, a name, while the clay is the only
truth:
“As everything made of gold is known by a single
lnmp of gold; being nothing more than a modification
of speech, a change, a name, while the gold is the only
truth:
"As everything made of sted is known by a single
pair of nail-scissors; being nothing more than a modi*
fication of speech, a change, a name, while’the sted ii
the only truth:
“ Such, my son, is that instruction, by which the un¬
heard becomes .heard, the .unthought thought, the un¬
known known. Existent only, my son, was this in the
'beginning, one only, without duality.”
The Indian schoolmen are never tired of quoting this
text, and proclaiming that the visible and nameable
aspects of the world, as they fictitiously present them¬
selves in place of, and veil, the one and only Self, are
 246 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. ix. nothing more than " a modification of speech, a change

a name." ' The reader may be reminded in the next
place of the following verses of the Muijdaka Upani-
shad:—
*They that are infatnated, dwelling in the midst of
«iS5»attfo» the illusion, wise in their own eyes, and learned in their
m«»ndv«du own conceit, are stricken with repeated plagues, and go
w££Lp.““ round and round, like blind men led by the blind.
“As its kindred sparks fly out in thousands from a
blazing fire, so do the various living souls proceed out'
of that imperishable principle, and return into it again.
“That infinite spirit is self-luminous, without and
within, without origin, without vital breath or thinking
faculty, stainless, beyond the imperishable ultimate.”
The ultimate here spoken of is the undeveloped
principle that develops itself into all the variety of the
visible and nameable, the primitive world-fiction. In
the following verses of the same TJpanishad the same
. principle is spoken of under the name of darkness.
The Self is the light of lights beyond the darkness:—■
" It is over this Self that sky and earth and air are
woven, and the sensory with all the organs of sense and
motion. Enow that'this is the one and only Self.
Renounce all other words, for this is the bridge to im¬
mortality.
“This Self dwells in the heart where the arteries
are concentred, variously manifesting itself. Ok : thus
meditate upon the Self. May it be well with yon, that
yon may cross beyond the darkness.
“ The saga, quitting name and colour, enters into the
self-luminous spirit, beyond the last principle, in like
manner as the rivers flow on until they quit their name
and colour, and lose themselves in the sea.”
tteuh* In the Katha TJpanishad we read:—
suntrutTth* " Far apart are these diverse and diverging paths, the
wtththcUfeoF path of illusion and the path of knowledge. I know
ta*rt*dg*1 thee, Nachiketas, that thou art a seeker of knowledge,
 OF THE (JPANISHADS. 247

lor all these pleasures that 1 have proposed have not Chat. n..
distracted thee.
“ For their objects are beyond and more subtile than
the senses, the common sensory is beyond the objects,
the mind is beyond the sensory, and the great soul
Hixanyagarbha is beyond the mind.
“ The ultimate and undeveloped principle is beyond
that great soul, and Purusha the Self is beyond the un¬
developed principle! Beyond Purusha there is nothing;
that is the goal, that is the final term.”
Here that out of which all things emanate is the
undeveloped principle, am/akta. AvyaJcta is also called
avy&krita, that which has not yet passed over into name
and colour. ‘This principle is the same as the expanse
which is said in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad to be
woven across and across the Self. It is also the same,
SankaxScharya says, as the sum of the powers of every
organism- and every organ that shall be, the genn of the
spheres of recompense.
Thus, then, we see that the TTpanishads teach that
there in only one thing that exists, the impersonal Self. wSad tats*
They teach also that there is a quasi-duality, a differ-SmbS/S*?-
entiation of something previously undifferenoed into £01* u£££
visible and nameable aspects. They teach that the*4’*5*-
things of the world of experience are a modification of
speech only, a.change, a name; that is, that apart from
the underlying Self-these things have only a nominal
existence. The undifferenoed, the source of name and
colour, is called the expanse, and is said to be* woven
across and across the impersonal Sell It is the dark¬
ness, the darkness that must be passed beyond in .order
to reach the light The order of things in which the
llower of the prescriptive sacra lives, the sacrifices,
the sacrifices, the works, and the recompenses of works,
are all illusion, avidycL They that live according to the
immemorial usages! putting their trust in them, * dwel¬
ling in the midst of the illusion, wise in their own eyes
 348 TUB PHILOSOPHY

cbat. ix and learned in their own conceit, are stricken with re*
‘ peated plagues, and. go round and round,, like blind men
led by the blind.” The Upanishads teach plainly that
this order of things is unreal. “ There is nothing second
to that Self, other than that, apart from thdfb, that it
should know."
The tenet of Maya is thus no modem invention.
The thought, if not the word, is everywhere present in
the Upanishads, as an inseparable element of the philo¬
sophy, and the word itself is of no infrequent occur¬
rence. The doctrine is more than implicit in the
Upanishads, and explicit xn the systematised Vedanta.
No earlier Vedanta, such as Colebrooke supposes, could
have been complete and • consistent without this ele¬
ment, and it is no graft of a later growth. In fact the
distinction between an earlier and a later Vedinta is
nugatory. There has been no addition to the system
from without, but only a development from within; no
graft, but only growth.
Tims'far it has been shown that the unreality of the
world is a datum of Indian thought earlier than the
ferlrakasutra or aphorisms of the'Vedanta. The next
task is to prove that the.same doctrine is taught in the
text of the Vedanta, these aphorisms themselves, and
also in the fullest and plainest manner in the gloss of
Sankara,
iiwnnrwBt^ It has been already said that perspicuous statements
txogfatta the are not to be looked for in the Sutras or aphorisms,
S»vediatta. As Colebraoke says, they are in tbe highest degree
obscure, and they could never have been intelligible
without an ample interpretation. The aphorisms never¬
theless do testify to the unreality of the world. In the
fourth section of the first Pada of the second Adhyiy
of the f^arlrakasutra, we read about the various objec¬
tions raised against the doctrine that Brahman is at
once the real basis underlying, the world,1 and the
1 UpddSna.
 OF THE UPAN1SH4DS. 249

principle that occasions it to come into being.1 The Cm f. IX,

reader will remember that Brahman is the reality in
place of which the figments of the world-fiction present
themselves; as the sand of the desert is the relative
reality in place of which the'waters of the mirage
present themselves; and also, though unaffected by it,
the principle that sets the world-fiction Maya in mo¬
tion, as a loadstone itself unmoved sets any adjacent
pieces of steel in motion. Brahman acts, or is said to
act, in virtue of its presence at and its illuminancy of
the cosmical illusion; as a Baja acts, or is said to act* by
being present at and witnessing the exertions of his
people. In reference to one of the objections to this
doctrine it is said in the thirteenth aphorism, “ If any nuaiity f»a
one object that on our doctrine there will be no dis- evety-day ex¬
tinction of subject and object, as the soul will he one ^
with its environment, we reply that the distinction will
still exist just as we see it in every-day life/* The
opponent is supposed to argue that if the soul and its
environment are alike unreal, and resolvable into ficti¬
tious emanations out of the one and only Self, the
distinction of subject and object will altogether dis¬
appear, and that this is a distinction that refuses to
he done away with, a distinction that persists in spite
of every effort to negate it. The author of the aphorisms
replies that the distinction will remain as it is, a dis¬
tinction of every-day experience, ^ankaracharya in
his comments on this aphorism remarks, “ The distinc¬
tion will hold good in our teaching, as it is seen in
common life. The ocean is so much water, and the
foam, the ripples, the waves, and ihe bubbles that
arise out of that water are alike one with it, and yet
they differ among themselves. The foam is not the
ripple, the ripple is not the wave, the wave is not the
bubble; and yet the foam is water, the ripple is water,
the wave is water, the bubble is water. The distinction
1 Ninuttcu
 2 50 „ THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. ix. of subject and object is of a similar nature. The spul

is not the environment, the environment is not the
soul; the soul is Self, the environment is Self.” The
Vie manifold aphorism that immediately follows is, “ That they
are nothing else than that appears from the terms
HhSgel’a* modification” &e. This refers to. the text of 4he
Chhandogya Upanishad: “ As everything made of clay
is. known by a single lump of clay; being nothing
more than a modification of speech, a change, a name,
while the clay is the only truth,” &c. This text means
nothing else than that the many as many has only
a nominal existence, reality residing in the one. True,
being is characterless and uniform, ^ankaracharya
says in the course of his remarks upon this aphorism:
“ The whole order of subject and object, of migrating
souls and of their fruition of recompenses,. is, apart
from the Self, unreal; in like manner as. the ether in
this and that pot or jar is nothing else tnan the ethefc
at large that permeates all things, itself one and' un¬
divided; and in like manner as the waters of a mirage
are nothing else than the sands of the desert, seen for
a while and vanishing, and having no real existence.”
The twenty.eightfi aphorism of the first Pada of the
The variety^ ol second Adhyaya is: And likewise in the Self there
uklumnrf- are diversified objects.” On this &ankaracharya re-
•tyofadretm. , « n ia of no use to object. How can there be
a various creation in the one and only Self, unless it
abolish its own unity in order to pass into plurality ?
Tor there is a multiform creation iu the one and only
Self, in the dreaming state of the soul, without any
suppression qf its unitary nature. We read in the Bji-
hadarapyaka Upanishad, There are no chariots, no
horses, no roads, but it presents to itself chariots,
horses, and roads. In the world of daily life gods
and thaumaturgists are seen to create multiform crea¬
tions, elephants, horses, and the like, themselves mean¬
while remaining what they are. In the same way a
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 25*

manifold creation is competent to the Self, one though n«i» jx.

it be, ■without any forfeiture of its simple essence.”
Another aphorism to the point is the fiftieth Sutra of
the third Pada of the third Adbyaya,—“And it is a!°inowimu.
mere semblance.” This aphorism occurs in the course
of an exposition of the relation of the migrating sonl to
l&rara, the world-evolving deity or Demiurgus. The
forty-ninth aphorism has already stated that there.is
no confusion in the retributive awards; each migrating
soul being linked to its own series of bodies, and thus
taking no part in the individual experiences of other
souls.- The aphorism now before us goes on to say that
the individual soul is, as individual, a mere appearance.
‘‘The individual soul,” such is Sankaracharya’s inter¬
pretation, “is only a semblance of the one and only
Self, as the sun imaged upon a watery surface is only
a semblance of the one and only sun in the heavens.
The individual sonl is not another and independent
entity. The sun mirrored upon one pool may tremble
with the rippling of the surface, and the sun reflected
upon* another may be motionless. In the same way
one soul may have experience of such and such retri¬
butions, and another soul may remain unaffected by
tfiem."
Surely in all this we have the tenet of the unreality
of the world in the text of the Vedanta, and the full¬
blown dogma of illusion in the gloss of Sankara. What¬
ever mav be our respect for tbe authority of Colebrooke,
it is rime to see things with our own eyes, and to cease
to let him see them for us.
So much for the text of the-Vedanta. We come new
to the gloss of Sankara, and there can be no mistake as ^
regards the character of his teaching. Here are some
specimens of it.1 “ If we allowed any independent pro-
existence as the principle ont of which the world eman- agbariu*a(
ates,. we should be open to tbe charge of teaching
1 &8rfr^»mTmann5l>hfiihy» i 4, 3,
 252 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. ix. Pradliana as tlie Sankhyas do. But the pre-existence

— or potentiality of the world which we maintain, is not
independent like that asserted by the Sankhyas, but
dependent on the Demiurgus. The potentiality we
contend for must be conceded to us. It is indispens¬
able, for without it no account could- be given of the
creative operancy of the Demiurgus-; for if he had no
power, no f^akti, he could not proceed to his creative
energy. If there were no such potentiality the liberated
souls themselves would return to metempsychosis; for
they escape out of metempsychosis only by burning
away that, germinating power in the fire of spiritual
intuition. This power of the seed of the world-tree is
illusion, Avidya, also called the undeveloped or unex-
plicated principle, the world-fiction, the great sleep of
the Demiurgus, in which all migrating souls must con¬
tinue to sleep so long as they wake not to tlieir proper
nature. This same undeveloped principle is sometimes
spoken of as tne expanse, as in the text of the Briiiada-
ranyaka Upanishad,—The ethereal expanse is woven
warp and woof across the imperishable Self. At other
times it is spoken of as the imperishable, as in the text
of the Mmjdaka Upanishad,—Beyond the imperishable
ultimate. At other times as Maya, as in the text of tl$
Svetaivatara Upanishad,—Let the sage know that
Prakriti is Maya, and that MaheSvara is the MSyin or
arch-illusionist. This same Maya is unexplicated or
undeveloped in that it cannot be described either as exis¬
tent or as non-existent. Hence it is said in the Hatha
Upanishad,—The undeveloped principle is beyond that
great soul. If we take the great soul to be Hiranya-
gsrbha, the great soul emanates out of the undeveloped,
out of the world-fiction. If we take the great soul tc
be the migrating spirit, it may still be said that the
undeveloped is beyond the great soul, for the migrating
soul owes its individual life to the undeveloped principle.
The undeveloped is Avidya, illusion, and all that the
 OF THE VPANISHADS . *53
soul aoes and 'suffers, it does and suffers because it is Cha?. nr,
illuded.”
A little further on Sankaracharya says,1 “ Until this
illusion ceasej the migrating soul is implicated in good
and evil works, and its individuality cannot pass away
from it. As soon as the illusion passes away, the pure
and characterless nature of the soul is recognised in
virtue of the text, That art thou. The accession and
departure of this illusion makes no difference to the sole The world a »
reality, the impersonal Self. A man may see a piece of
rope lying in a dark place, may mistake it for a snake,
may be frightened, shudder, and run away. Another
person may tell him not to be afraid, for this is not a
snake, but only a piece of rope. As soon as he hears
this he lays aside his fear of the snake, ceases to
tremble, and no more thinks of flight. And all the
time there has been no difference in the real thing.
That was a piece of rope, both when it was taken
for a snake, and when the misconception passed
away”
In another place the same schoolman writes,® “ The
one and only-Self is untouched by the cosmic fiction*
in the same way that a thaumaturgist is untouched at
apy moment, present, past, or future, by the optical
illusion he projects, the illusion being unreal. A
dreamer is unaffected by the fictitious presentments of
his dream, these not prolonging themselves into his
waking hours, or into his peaceful sleep. In a like
way the one abiding spectator of the three states of
waking, dreaming, and pure sleep, is unaffected by
those successive states. For this manifestation of the
impersonal Self iu the three states is & mere illusion,4
toj much so as the fictitious snake that presents itself
in the place of the rope. Accordingly a teacher of
' authority has said, When the soul wakes up out of its .

3 Sansiiramaya. 4 M&yavr dtra.

 *54' THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. EC. sleep in the primeval illusion, it wakes up without

beginning, sleepless, dreamless, without duality.”
Faliltyofthe In another passage &ankaracharya writes: “In the
ra*ny, truth
text of the Chhandogya Upanishad, A modification of
004,
only of tha
speech only, it is stated that every emanation is ficti¬
tious; and truth or reality is astrioted to the one and
only highest principle1 in the text, All the world is
animated by that, that is real. The words which fol»
low; That is Self, that art thou, Svetaketu, teach that
the individual, migrating soul is the Self, The oneness
of the soul with the Self is already a fact, and not a
thing, that requires a further effort to bring about; and
therefore the recognition of the truth of the text is
sufficient to put an end to the personality of the soul;
in the same way as the recognition of the piece of. rope
is sufficient to abolish the snake that fictitiously pre¬
sents itself in place of the piece of rope. Itfo sooner is
the personality of the soul negated than the whole
spontaneous and conventional order of life is surfaced
along with it, to make up which the lower and plural,
manifestation of the Self fictitiously presents itself.
As. soon as a man sees that his soul is the Self, the
whole, succession of everyday life, with its agents, its
actions, and its recompenses, ceases to have any further
existence for him. This is indicated in the text of the
Bphadaraijyaka Upanishad, Where the whole world,is
Self, alone, what should one see another with ? It is
not correct to assert that this non-existence of the
world of daily life is true only in a particular state of
the soul, viz., in its state of extrication from metemp¬
sychosis, for the words That art thou do not limit the
oneness of the soul and the Self to any such special
condition of the souL”
The soul is never anything else than the one and
only Self; and all that it is; and sees, and does, and
suffers, is never anything else than a figment, of the
1 Sham evd paramakdranam,
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 255
world-fiction, J§ankaracharya proceeds to enforce this nm» rr
teaching by a reference to the allegory of the high-
wayman in the Sixth Prapa|haka of tire Chhandogya
Upanishad, which- he has just quoted. This. allegory
is, the reader will remember, as follows: "A high-
wav man leaves a wayfarer from Kandahar blindfold in
a desolate waste he has brought him to. The wayfarer
left blindfold in the waste, does not know what is east
or north or south, and cries out for guidance. A
passer-by unties his hands, and unbinds his eyes, and
points out the way towards Kandahar. The man goes
on, asking for village after village, and finally arrives at
Kandahar. In a like way a man is guided by a spiritual
teacher in his progress towards the final goal, the one
-and only Self.” Supposing the reader to be familiar
with this allegory, he goes on to say, " The parable of the
highwayman teaches that a man who lives for the fic¬
tions of everyday life is implicated in metempsychosis,
and that a man who lives for the truth is extricated
from it. In teaching this it teaches that unity alone is
real, and that plurality is a figment of fictitious vision
or- illusion.1 The phases of everyday fife have a kind ibmiub
of truth prior to the knowledge that the soul is the Self, 5*E*t£om
as the phases of a dream are true till the sleeper wakes £££!*«■
up out of his dream. No one becomes aware of the
unreality of all that goes on in daily life, the fictitious
nature of the soul, of the things around it, and of the
recompenses of its actions, until he ,learns that his soul
is one with the solely real Sell Until he learns this
every one loses sight of his essential oneness with the
Self, and supposes that the modes of manifested being
are he and his. In this way the procedure of daily life
-and the religion of the Vedas are valid, until we wake
to the truth that the soul is one with the characterless
Sell It is as with a man in his dreams. He sees a
variety of scenes and situations, and this- is, until he
1 Mithyiijn&na.
 2j6 THE PHILOSOPHY

Chat. Et wakes up, an assured perceptional experience, and rot

a mere semblance of perception.
“ Perhaps some one will say. If the world is a figment,
the teaching of the Upanishads is a part of the world,
and therefore itself a figment. How can any one learn
from this teaching the truth that the soul is the Self ?
A man does not die of the bite of the snake he sees in
a piece of rope, nor is he any the better for drinking the
water of a mirage or bathing in it. This objection is
null Men have been known to die of drinking a bever¬
age merely imagined to be poison. When they sleep
and dream they are bitten by unreal snakes, and bathe
in unreal water. The objector will say that the snake¬
bite and the bath are unreal also. We reply that the
snake-bite and the bathing of the dream are unreal,
bqt the vision of them by the dreamer is a fact, for this
apprehension is not negatived on waking up. As soon
as the sleeper wakes he knows that the snake-bite and
the bathweie figments, but he does not judge his vision
of them to have been a figment.”
The ».if-£eign. A little further on he writes: 1,1 The omniscience of
the body of the Deuuurgus is relative to the evolution of Avidya,
theooeznic . »
goal or Demi*, fcuegerm of name and colour, of the visible and name-
eMnteaoui* able aspects of things. In such texts as, From thi
Wy, »part same Self the ether emanated, it appears that the world
ftcan. the , * * . _ _x A
ore alike on- comes out of, is sustained by, and passes hack into the
f“J' Demiurgus e„ver pure, intelligent, and free, all-knowing
andaj-po'smrful; not out of, by, and into Pradhana or
any other unconscious principle. Name and colour, the
figments of illusion, the body as it were of the omni¬
scient Demiurgus, not explicable as existent or as non¬
existent, the germs of the world' of metempsychosis,
are called in Sruti and in Smriti the Maya, $akti, or
Prakriti of the world-evolving deity. The omniscient
Demiurgus is other than these, as is said in the text,
It is the expanse which unfolds itself into name and
 OF THE UPANISHADS , 257

colour, and these are in the Self. The Demiurgus then chap, ix
manifests himself in the fictitious forms of the names
and colours presented by the cosmical illusion; as the
all-pervading ether manifests .itself in fictitious limita¬
tion as in this and that pot or jar. In the domain of
th$ ordinary, unphilosophic life, the Demiurgus pre¬
sides over all the innumerable migrating spirits or con¬
scious souls. These souls are identical with himself, in
the same way as the ether localised in this or that jar
is identical with the ubiquitous ether one and un¬
divided ; and they are individualised by attachment to
the various bodies and organs fashioned out of the
names and colours presented by the world-fiction.
Thus, then, the Demiurgus is a Demiurgus, is all¬
knowing and all-poweiful, only in relation to the limi¬
tations of his fictitious body, the cosmical illusion. In
real truth this conventional order of things, with its
presiding deity and the souls presided over, has no
existence in the Self; for the Self is a pure essence
apart from all the fictitious limits of individual life.
And therefore it is said, That is the infinite in which
one sees nothing else, hears nothing qjse, and knows
nothing else; and again. When all this world is Self
and Self alone, what should one see any one with ? In
such passages as these the Upanishads teach that, in
the state of pure reality, every form of conventional
existence, all that we are and do and suffer in this daily
life, ceases to have any being”1 I^vara,'S^^aracharya
means, is the first figment of the world-ficuon. Sup¬
press the world-fiction, and l^vara is no longer Iivara
but Brahman, for ISvara belongs to the world of every-
' day, conventional existence, not to the real world, the
spiritual unity, into which the theosophist aspires to
rise.
It would be easy to multiply proofs that the tenet of
illusion is taught in the gloss of Sankara. But this is
1 Paramartluivasthd = mdaMrcutid.
E
 258 THE PHILOSOPHY

Ob4|^ pc. needless: the passages already presented to the reader

prove that this tenet is taught as directly andunmis-
iakablyin $ankar3eharya a commentary on the apk*
risms of the Vedanta as in any of his other works.
There is as much to countenance it in the sutras of
Vyasa and the gloss of Sankara, as in the minor com*'
mentaries and elementary treatises. It is no graft of
a later growth, but % vital element of the primitive
philosophy of the Upanishads. Sankara found this
tenet in the Upanishads, and there we cannot fail to
find it also. It is everywhere- implied in the idea of
the sole reality of the Self; and not only so, but the
reality of duality is expressly denied, and a principle
of unreality is expressly announced, the. undeveloped
germ of the visible and nameable aspects of the world,
the expanse that is woven warp and woof across the
Self. That the world is a series of shows and sem¬
blances that come and go and have no stay, is part and
parcel of the earliest type of Indian philosophy. This
philosophy has had its growth and development, but
each later has had its virtual pre-existence in each
earlier stage. What has been more implicit has be¬
come more explicit, but there has been no addition from
without, no interpolation of foreign elements. The asser
tion of the Orientalists that the doctrine of Maya h a
comparatively modern importation into the Vedantic
system is groundless, and the hypothesis of a primitive
Vedinta in harmony with the system known as the
Yogad&rlana or demiurgic Sankhya is untenable.
Tb« Kwrceof This brings us to .the source of Colebrooke’s error.
His mistake arose from the acceptance of the polemical
tuwS&n statement of an opponent of the Vedantins, Vijpana-
tibsHbv, *n ■ bhikshu, the celebrated exponent of the aphorisms Or
the Sankhya, the authoi of the Sankhyapravachana-
Ijpauisbaris. bhashya. According to Dr. Fitz-Edward Hall, Vijna-
nabbikshu in all probability lived in the sixteenth or
seventeenth fcentury of the Christian era. In his com-
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 259

mentary on the Sankhya aphorisms, VijMnabhiksliu caw. IX.

propounds a theory that the several Darsanas or sys¬
tems of Indian philosophy, are successive steps of
ascent to the full truth of the demiurgic Sankhya or
Yoga philosophy. This demiurgic Sankhya he holds
to be identical with the primitive form of the Brah-
■roamlmansa, or Ved&nta. Bach system, he says, is valid
for the instalment of truth which it conveys. Where
any system negatives part of the truth, it does so
because the portion of truth negatived is no part
of the instalment of truth propounded in that particu¬
lar system. Thus, for example, he would treat the
Sankhya denial of Is vara, the Demiurgus or world-evol¬
ving deity. Otherwise, such a negation, he says, may be
regarded as an audacious averment of private judg¬
ment.1 Or again, he says, we may regard the untrue
portions of any of the earlier, systems as a test of faith
designed to exclude from the full truth those that are
unprepared to receive it.; a test to shut out the uu-
wprthy aspirant from a release from metempsychosis.
As'a part of this attempt, his own personal effort, to
treat the systems as successively complementary reve¬
lations, he tries to force the Vedanta, or philosophy of
the Upanishads, into, accord with the demiurgic San-
khta, Now to this there are two great obstacles, the
Vedantic tenet of the unreality of the world, and the
Vedantic tenet of the unity of souls in the Self.
VijMnabhikshu accordingly pronounces that the doc¬
trine of Maya is a modern, invention of persons false y
styling themselves Vedantins, but really crypto-Bud¬
dhists?* scions of the VijMnavadins or Buddhist sen-
satiouai.nihilists. He appeals to a primitive Vedanta
that teaches the two ruling tenets of the Sankhya, the
reality of the world, and the plurality of Purushas
or Selves. It has been proved in this chapter that such
a primitive Vedanta mprec. existed. VijMnabhikshu a.
1 SkadetiySn&M praudhatidsh. *
 a6o THE PHILOSOPHY

Chap. IX. assertion that the primitive Vedanta taught the plu¬
Vijuitoabhik- rality of Puruslias or Selves has not deceived anybody:
shu's state¬ why should we admit the deception of his concomitant
ment it alto¬
gether base¬
less.
assertion that the primitive Vedanta taught the reality
of the world ? The two statements are alike put forth
in the teeth of all the facts, and .are equally false;
though possibly his statement that the primitive
Vedanta taught the plurality of Puruslias is the more
glaring falsity. It is true that Vijftanabhikshu cites a
passage of the Padmapurana in which the tenet of
Maya is said to be crypto-Buddhistic, and to have been
proclaimed in the Kali age of the world, by Siva in the
person of a Brahman, for the ruin of mankind. In the
face of the plain teaching of the TJpanishads this cita¬
tion fails to move us. At the most it can only prove
that VijMnabhikshu was not the first to stigmatise the
doctrine of Maya as a piece of crypto-Buddhism. We
have nothing to do but to look at the Upanishads and
at the aphorisms of the Vedanta, to weigh the tradi¬
tionary and authoritative expositions of the Vedantic
doctors, and to judge for ourselves. The Vedantic
schoolmen, &ankaracharya and the rest, speak to us ex
caikedfA, and we have seen how natural and effortless
their exposition is. We may set aside the mere asser¬
tions of their adversaries. Be it remembered, too, that
Yijftanabhiksliu’s proposal to treat the several systems
as progressive instalments of the truth, has no counte¬
nance in the works of Indian scholasticism. The sys¬
tems are in those works exhibited on every page as ,in
open hostility against each other. Vijhanabhikshn’s
treatment of the philosophy of the Upanishads in, false
from first to last; and Colebrooke’s assertion falls with
the fall of the assertion of Vijfianabhikshu.
The ocean of In the very beginning of Indian philosophy, in the
metempsy¬
chosis is un¬ teaching of the Upanishads no less than in the teach¬
real, the Self,
the sou that* ing of the Vedantic schoolmen, the world is an illusion.
shines upon
its wares,
ulnae Is real.
The migrating souls, their environments, their places of
 OF THB upanishads. 261

reward and punishment, the gods, the world-evolving Chap. is.

deity himself, are figments of a fiction that has feigned
itself from all eternity. The one Self in all souls is the
only true being. This Self shines in every mind, as
fine sun shines reflected upon innumerable waters. It
shines on the ocean of metempsychosis, lighting up all
its waves. “ It seems to think, it seems to move,” in
the migrating souls that are its fictitious presentments
in this fictitious world; as the sun seems to move with
the motion of the waves that reflect it. These waves
are the migrating souls. The Self seems to act and to
suffer, to. be soiled with all the stains of earthly life; and
is all the time inert and impassive, a .pure, unsullied
brightness; a sun that looks down upon the imperfec¬
tions of the world and is untainted by them. The
reader be reminded of the simile with which
Ferrxer illustrates the teaching of Xenophanes. The
sensible world is for Xenophanes “ a mere phenomenon,
and possesses no such truth as that which reason
compels us to attribute to the permanent one, which
according to Xenophanes is God. His tenets on this
point may be illustrated as follows: Suppose that the
sun is shining on the. sea, and thafc his light is broken
oy the waves into a multitude of lesser lights, of all
colours and of all forms; and suppose that the sen is
conscious, conscious of this multitude of lights, this
diversity of shifting colours, this plurality of dancing
forms, would this consciousness contain or represent the
truth, the real ? Certainly it would not. The objec¬
tively true, the real in itself, is in this case the sun in
the hetivens, the one permanent, the persistent in colour
and form. Its diversified appearance in the sea, the
dispersion of its light in myriad colours and in myriad
forms, is nothing and represents nothing which sub¬
stantially exists; but is only something which exists
phenomenally, that is, unsubstantially and unreally, in
the sea."
 262 THE PHILOSOPHY

CHAP. IX. With this proof of the primitive antiquity of tb

— doctrine of Maya, we may close this survey of the
philosophy of the tfoanSshads.
jiecapituia- This philosophy was a new religion with a new
ptSosopby of promise, a religion not of the many bat of the few.

sbada?neV The promise is no longer a promise of felicity in this

wor«perfect life or in a higher life, but a promise of release from the

reSusMof'tbe sorrows of the heart; of a repose unbroken by a dream,

jungle. ^ everlasting peace, m which the Soul shall cease to be
% so4 and shall be merged in the one and only Self the
characterless being, characterless thought, and character¬
less beatitude.
it took the The primitive Vedic religion had already become a
•uUer Vedio half-living form of words. The hymns of the Risliis,
«u!ri!wtn» the daily observances, the lustrations and sacrifices
■uthe^Mhef*. were still handed down and repeated from to age,
wra’udtho as revered elements of the common life; and the repeti-
av«yformof tion of these, and the hope of rising in this life or iu an
uioprcToiied. after-life, still made up the religion of the multitude.
This religion was not mold; and emotional, but me¬
chanical; each item of conformity carrying' with hits
promised item of reward. Wealth w«& to be accumu¬
lated for the winning of merit; for the wealthy sacrifice];
might aspire to a place in a paiadise, or the 'position or
a deity. The gods were to be praised and fed witfl
sacrifices, that they might send rain and feed their
Worshippers; and the praises, prayers, and Sacrifices
were to be Offered up in proper form by professional
liturgists.
Upon this religion supervened the beliefs in the
migration of the soul, and in the misery of every foam
of life, beliefs accruing from contact and intermixtufO
with the melanous indigenes. A new estimate pipe-,
sented itself of the value of the rewards of conformity
with prescriptive usages, and of costly rites. The
whole earth replete with riches will not make a man
immortal. Death is still before the eyes of the re-
 OF THE VPANISHADS. 263

loapded worshipper, and death is to bring no peaceful Char ES.

sleep; the dream of life will be followed by an after-
am, and this by another* in endless succession. The
worshipped is deluded, and his reward is a delusion.
The pleasures the gods have, and may give him, are
tainted and fugitive, os all pleasures are: they, are things
that may or may not be to-morrow. Care fellows the
recompensed conformist into the very paradise his
merits win for- him: he cariirtffc stay there for ever
and he wilt see many there in higher places than him
self- The whole order of the popular religion, With
its rifceS and their rewards, is a darkness, an illusion,
and light and verity must be looked foT somewhere
else. The 'tliiist for pleasure, and the craving for
religious recompenses, are the springs of the actions
of the &ot& which implicate it in metempsychosis.
This thirst and craving lie at the root of the world-
tree; Volition1»the origin of eviL The aspirant to
release from metempsychosis must refrain from every
desire and Cyery act otw$i -Good works, no less than
evil works* are imperfections that must be put away.
They lead only to higher embodiments, to higher
spheres indeed, hut still to spheres tainted with misery;
for the pleasures even of a paradise are fleeting and
unequally allotted. So long as the living being acts,
so long, must he suffer the retribution of Ms good and
evil, acts in body after body, in seon after aeon. TBe
religion of immemorial usages and of liturgic rites be¬
longs to the people of the world, and, like every other
form of activity, tends only to prolong the miseries of
metempsychosis. From the true point of view taught
•to the initiated, in the philosophy of the Gpanistads,
action ami passion, works-and the recompenses of works,
the religion of ancestral rites and usages, the sacrifices,
and the gods sacrificed to, ate alike unreal They are
1 Sankalpaiji, rarjai/d tatmit tan'&mrtluwja tSraxam, Viwfc*-
chtfcjtlmam, v. 330.
 264 THE PHILOSOPHY

<jhap. is. figments of the world-fiction, and for the finished theo
— sophist they have no existence. They belong to the
world of semblances, the dream of souls as yet
The old ten- awakened. Nevertheless these things have their fruits
Sdfofthe in the phantasmagory of metempsychosis, and to taste
S'pTto these fruits the unawakened soul must pass from body
to body, from sphere to sphere, as through dream after
dream. They that live in the world and neglect the
prescriptive pieties, pass along the evil, path,1 again and
oithogoda. agaia to ephemeral insect lives. They that live in the
village in obedience to the religion of rites and usages,
ascend after death along the path of the progenitors *
to the lunar world. There they sojourn for a while till
their reward is over, and return to fresh embodiments.,
They that add a knowledge of the significance of these
rites, and..of the nature of the gods, to'their con ormity,
ascend utter death tdoug the path of the gods- to
the solar world. There they proceed to the courts of
Brahma, the supreme divinity; to abide there till the.
close of the aeon, and to oe sect hack into the world at
Thtotdrdi- the next palingenesis. These have followed the way
StehirttuSb «£ wks,4 the religion Of usages and rites, a religion
1which has its h^jber use in purifying the mind of the
votary, it may be in the course of many successive lives,
until he is ready to enter the way of knowledge,® to be
initiated into the religion of renunciation and ecstatic
vision, the theosophy of the anchorites of the forest.
Moral and religious excellence has its only true value
in the preliminary purification of the .soul, in so far as
it tends to fit the mind for the pursuit of liberator
light and intuition. This kind of excellence lies chiefly
in conformity to the traditionary routine of life and
Yedic ritual The Brahman has come into the world
with three debts to pay,—his debt to the Bishis to re¬
peat and transmit their hymns and the exposition of
1 Kathfha gatifr. s Pitfiyina. * Devaydna.
4 K.<untutfc&ry(l, * JiananiAm* Jmatn
 OF THE UPANISHADS. 265

their hymns; his debt to the Pitris or ancestral spirits. Chap* ix.
to beget children to offer cakes and water for them to
live upon in the next generation; and his debt to the
gods, to make oblations to them for their sustenance,
that they may be able to send the fertilising rain upon
thp fields. These debts belong, it is true, to the world
of semblances: the Brahman may proceed straight from
his sacred studentship to the forest, jf he will; and yet,
in general, it is not till he has paid these debts that he
is to retire to the jungle, to meditate at leisure on the
vanities of life and the miseries of the procession of
lives to come, and to strive to win release from further
life in the body by self-torture, by the crushing of every
thought and feeling, by rising to vacuity, apathy, and
isolation, that he may refund his personality into the
impersonality of the one and only Self. This is the The oia wa¬
ne w religion, a Teligion of cataleptic insensibility and
ecstatic vision for the purified and initiated few, that
see* for final liberation. Not exertion, but inertion, is
the path to liberation. There is no truth and no peace ^v^bSduy*
in the plurality of experience; truth and peace are to SSawSSta
be found only in the one beneath it and beyond it. SuSoT1
This one existent is the Self, the spiritual essence that
gives life and light to all things living,1 permeating them
all from a tuft of grass up to the highest deity ol the
Indian worshipper. This Self, this highest Self, Atman,
Brahman, Paramatman, is being, thought, and bliss,
undifferenced ; other than which nothing is, and other
than which all things onlv seem to be. This one and
only Self is near to all, dwelling in the heart of every
living thing, present in the mind within the heart.
The light within the etlieT of the heart is the light that
lightens all the world. Withdraw it, and all things •
will lapse into blindness, darkness, nothingness.8 To
see it, to become one with it, to pass away into that
light of lights beyond the darkness of the world-fiction,
1 Sattasphurtiprada. * TadaUdre jagadandhym pramjycta.
 266 ' ZHB PHILOSOPHY

Chap. ix. is the only aspiration of the wise. This light is hiddeti
" * from the unwise, who infill in ths midst of the illusions
of the world; they can nouaore see it than a blind man
can see the sun. The wise man sees it as the cloud of
illusion dispenses, and the ecstatie vision dawns upon
his mind. In order to.-see t$ tf personality tnust be put
away; and it is only when thifc light Within,fibril reveal
itself to the pure intelligence, only When every thought
aud feeling and volition shall have Incited away in the
rigorous contemplation of that the personality of the
aspirant shall pass away into impersonality and ever¬
lasting peace. The darkness of the cosmical illujrioi.
passes, and the light remains for ever, a pure, un-
difJbrenced light, a characterless being, thought, and
blessedness. If a man wilt see this light, he must first
loose himself from every t# put away all the desires
of his heart, part from his wife and children, ana rom
all that he has, and retire into the solitude of the for st;
tbe^e to engage in a long course of Aelf-torture, and of
that suppression of every feeling, desire, and thought
that is fcc end in catalepsy tfud ecstatic vision.
The new the<»- There is little that is spiritual in* all this* The pri-
^rit^thau mitive Indian philosophers ‘ tea^h that individual
servauce of self is to be annulled by being merged 'in the highest
prescriptive ge|r xh.eir teaching in this regard has been so often
mistaken and misstated, that it is' important to insist
upon the difference between the ancient Indian mystic
and the modern idealist. The difference must have
made itself plain enough to the reader pf these pages.
He will have seen fbr himself how the Indian sages,
as the Upanishads phStsme them, seek for participation
in the divine life, not by pure feeling, high thought
and strenuous endeavour,—not by an unceasing effort
to learn the true and do the right,—but by the crushing
out of every feeling and every thought, ,by vacuity,
apathy, inertion, and .ecstasy. They do not for a
moment mean- that the purely individual feelings and
 OF THE UPANISHADS. z6j

volitions are to be suppressed in order that the philo- chap, ix

gopher may live in free obedience to the monitions of it isi^pir*.
a higher common nature. Their highest Self is little
more than an empty name,, a caput mortuum of the thegrodfbut
abstract understanding. Their pursuit is not a pursuit
of ^perfect character, but of perfect .characterlessness.
They place perfection if. the pure indetermination of
thought, the final residue of prolonged abstraction; not
in the higher and‘higher types of life and thought
successively intimated in the idealising tendencies of
the mind, as among the progressive portions of the
Human race. The epithets of the sole reality, the
highest Self, are negative, or if positive they are unin¬
telligible. It is a uniformity of indifferent being,
thought, and bliss. It is a mass of thought and bliss,
as fire is a mass of heat and light. It is thought
alw a the same and ever objectless, thought without
a tl inker or things to think of. It is a bliss in which
there is. no soul to be glad, and no sense of gladness.
It is a light which lightens itself, for the?g is nothing
else for it to lighten This is the gain above all gains,
a bliss above all Vther bliss, a knowledge above all
other knowledge. It is no part of the spirit of the
Indian sages to seek to see things as they are, and to
help to fashion them as they ought to be, to let the
power at work in the world work freely through them;
to become “docile echoes of the eternal voice, and
pliant organs of the infinite will.” This neither was
nor could be the spirit of men. of .their race, their age,
and their environment. The time, and the men for
these things had not yet appeared. This is the spirit
■in which many a man now works, to whom philo¬
sophy is a name, and who would smile to hear himself
called an idealist. It is not the spirit of the ancient
Indian sage, Brahmanical or Buddhist. For these there
is no quest of verity aad of an active law of righteous¬
ness, hut only a yearning after resolution into the
 //
. 268 'THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE UPANJSHADS.

3hap« iXc- fontal unity of undifferenced being; or, in the case of

the Buddhist, a yearning after a lapse into the void, a
return* to the primeval nothingness of: thing3. The
effort is to shake off every mode of personal existence,
and to be out of the world for ever, in the Unbroken
repose of absorption or annihilation.
Such as they are, and have been shown to be, the
Upanisliads are the loftiest utterances of Indian intelli¬
gence. They are the work of a rude age, a deteriorated
race, and a barbarous and unprogressive commufiity.
Whatever value the reader may assign to the ideas
they present, they aae #he highest produce of the
ancient Indian mind, ahf! almost the only elements oi
interest in Indian literature, which is at every stage
replete with them to satttt&tion.

(°< *

Is/ THE END.

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