SOLUTION OF THE QUESTIONS.
Argument. First the Counsellor’s reply to the Questions.
Vasishtha continued:—After the giant-like progeny of the Rákshasa had
proposed her occult questions, in the deep gloom of night in that thick
forest, the good and great counsellor began to give his replies. (The
repetition of the word great in the original, expresses the solemnity
of the occasion; as the disquisitions concerning the Great God in the
Áranyakas or forest lectures of the vedic Rishis, were conducted with
great solemnity in their holy hermitage in forests. So was the Sermon
on the Mount of Jesus).
2. The Counsellor said:—Hear, me! thou dark and cloud like form! to
unravel thy riddling questions, with as great ease as the lion foils the
fury of gigantic elephants.
3. All thy questions relate to the Supreme Spirit, and are framed in thy
enigmatical language, to try the force of our penetration into their
hidden meanings.
4. The soul which is Selfsame with the intellect which is minuter than a
particle of air, is that atomic principle that thou dost inquire into,
because it is a nameless minim imperceptible by the six organs of sense,
and unintelligible to the mind. (Answer to the first question about the
atom. अणु).
5. Underlying the atomic intellect, is the minute seed which contains
this universe; but whether it is a substantial or unsubstantial reality,
nobody can say. (This is the answer to the second question with regard
to the mundane seed).
6. It is called a reality from our notion of its being the soul of all
by itself, and it is from that soul that all other existences have come
in to being. (Answer about the nature of God).
7. It is a void from its outward inanity, but it is no void as regards
its intellect (which is a reality); it is said to be nothing from its
imperceptibility, but it is a subtile something from its
imperishableness. (All finite bodies are unreal, the immortal soul is
real, and identic with the Supreme soul).
8. It is not a nothing from its being permeated in all things, (_i.e._
though all pervading yet it is an absolute entity); for all things are
but reflexions of the minute Intellect, and its unity shines forth in
the plurality, all which is as unreal, as the formal bracelet formed of
the substantial gold.
9. This minutial is the transcendental vacuum, and is imperceptible
owing to its minuteness; and though it is situated in all things, yet it
is unperceived by the mind and external senses.
10. Its universal pervasion cannot make it void and null, because all
that is (existent) is not that (Intellect), which alone is known as the
thinking principle, that makes us speak, see and act.
11. No kind of reasoning can establish the non-entity of the real Ens
(sat), because of it is not being seen by anybody. Yet the universal
soul is known in its hidden form, like the unseen camphor by its smell.
12. The unlimited soul resides in all limited bodies, and the atomic
intellect pervades the vast universe; and it is in the same manner as
the mind fills all bodies, in its purely subtile state unknown to the
senses.
13. It is one and all, the unity as well as plurality, by its being the
soul of each and all, both singly as well as collectively, and its
supporting and containing each and all by and within itself.
14. All these worlds are as little billows in the vast ocean of the
divine Intellect; whose intelligence, like a liquid body, shows itself
in the form of eddies in the water. (Hence nothing is different from the
Supreme).
15. This minutiae of the intellect being imperceptible to the senses and
the mind, is said to be of the form of vacuity; but being perceived by
our consciousness, it is not a nothing, although of the nature of a void
in itself.
16. I am That and so art thou, by our conviction of the unity (of the
spirit); but neither am I That nor thou art He, by believing ourselves
as composed of our bodies only. (It is in answer of what art thou &c.
Spiritually considered all souls are the same with the supreme; but
being viewed in the body, all bodies are different from one another, and
quite apart from their unity with the Divine spirit).
17. Our egoism and tuism being got rid of by our knowledge of truth, we
cease to be the _ego_ and _tu_; and so all other persons lose all their
properties (_svayam_ or _suum_) in the sole Unity. (This is an
enlargement of the preceding answer to the question—What art thou &c.).
18. This particle of the intellect is immovable, though it moves
thousand of miles over; and we find in our consciousness many a mile to
be composed in this particle. (The mind notwithstanding its wide range,
never stirs from its seat in the soul).
19. The mind is firmly seated in the vacuous intellect, from which it
never stirs, though it goes to all places where it is never located.
(This is the answer of what moveth not).
20. That which hath its seat in the body can never go out of it; as a
baby hanging on the breast of its mother, cannot look to another place
for its rest.
21. One though free to range over large tracts at will, will never start
from his own abode, where he has the liberty and power to do all he
likes.
22. Wherever the mind may rove, it is never affected by the climate of
that place; as a jar taken to a distant country with its mouth shut,
does not yield any passage to the light and air of that region into it.
(In answer to what remains in a place so as it does not remain there).
23. The cogitation and incogitancy of the intellect, being both
perceived in our minds, it is said to be both intellection as well as
dullness of the intellect. (This is the answer “of what is ever active,
yet as dull as a block of stone”).
24. When our intellection is assimilated into the solid substance of
Divine Intellect, then is our intellect said to become solidified as a
stone. (By forgetting one’s self to a stone. Pope).
25. The worlds which the intellect of the Supreme Being has spread in
the infinite space, are the most wonderful as they are his increate
creations. (These being but manifestations of his inborn essence).
26. The Divine Soul is of the essence of fire, and never forsakes its
igneous form. It inheres in all bodies without burning them, and is the
enlightener and purifier of all substances. (This answers the question,
“what is fiery without its inflammability”).
27. The blazing intelligence of the divine soul, which is purer than the
etherial sphere, produces the elemental fire by its presence. (As the
burning of mount Sinai in the Bible and Taurus in the Koran, and the
fiery form of Brahmá the creator and regent of vulgar fire).
(This is in answer of “what unigneous entity produces the substance of
fire?”).
28. The intellect which is the light of the soul, and enlightener of the
lights of the luminous sun, moon and stars, is indestructible and never
fades; although the light of the luminaries, is lost on the last day of
universal doom. (In answer to “what unextinguishable fire is the kindler
of planetary lights”).
29. There is an inextinguishable light (glory), known as ineffably
transcendental, which the eye cannot behold, but is perceptible to the
mind as its inward illumination, and presenting all things to its view.
(Answer to “what light imperceptible to the eye, brings all things to
view?” This is spiritual light).
30. Thence proceeds the intellectual light, which transcends the
sensible and mental lights; and presents before it wonderful pictures of
things invisible to visual light. (It is luminous by itself and shows
things lying hid in darkness, as one walking in the dark, makes himself
known to another by telling him “it is I”).
31. The eyeless vegetable creation, is sensible of an inward light
within them, causing their growth and giving them the capability of
bearing their fruits and flowers. (In answer to the question regarding
the light and life of vegetable creation, which are also classed under
animated nature).
32. With regard to time, space and action and existence of the world,
all which are but the _percepta_ or perceptions of sense, and have no
master or maker, father or supporter except the Supreme Soul in whom
they subsist, as mere modifications of himself and are nothing of
themselves. (It is in answer to the question, “who is the maker of the
skies &c.”).
33. The atomic spirit is the casket of the bright gem of the world,
without changing its minuteness. The divine spirit is its measure and
measurer, beside which there is no separate world of itself. (Answer to
the question “who is the holder and measurer of the world”).
34. It is that Spirit which manifests itself in every thing in all these
worlds; but it shines as the brightest gem, when all the worlds are
compressed in it (at the universal dissolution).
35. From the unintelligibleness of his nature, he is said to be a speck
of obscurity, as he is called to be a ray of light, from the brightness
of his intellect. He is known as existent by our consciousness of him,
as he is said to be non-existent from his being removed from our visual
sight.
36. He is said to be afar from his invisibleness to our eyes, and to be
near us from his being of the nature of our intellect. He is represented
as a mountain for his being the totality of our consciousness, although
he is minuter than any perceptible particle. (In answer to “what is
minute yet vast”).
37. It is his consciousness that manifests itself in the form of the
universe; the mountains are not real existences, but subsist like the
Meru in his atomic substratum. (In answer to the question “how an atom
contains and expands itself as a hill &c.”).
38. A twinkling is what appears as a short instant, and a Kalpa is the
long duration of an age. (It is definitive proposition of identity, that
a _nimesha_ is a _nimesha_ and a _Kalpa_ is a _Kalpa_).
39. Sometimes a twinkling—instant represents a Kalpa, when it is fraught
with the acts and thoughts of an age; as an extensive country of many
leagues, is pictured in miniature or in a grain of the brain.
40. The course of a long _Kalpa_, is sometimes represented in the womb
of a _nimesha_ instant; as the period of the building of a great city,
is present in the small space of the mind’s remembrance, as it is in the
bosom of a mirror.
41. As little moments and Kalpa ages, high mountains and extensive
_yojanas_, may abide in a single grain of the intellect; so do all
dualities and pluralities unite and meet in the unity of God.
42. That ‘I have done this and that before’, is an impression derived
from the thought of our actual actions and activity at all times; but
the truth thereof becomes as untrue as our doings in the dream. (This to
prove that all _vyávahárika_ or customary events, are real untruths;
being but _prátibhásika_ or phenomenal appearances only).
43. It is calamity that prolongs the course of time, as our prosperity
on the otherhand diminishes its duration; as the short space of a
single night, appeared as a period of twelve long years to king Haris
Chandra in his misery. (The fallacy of human conception of the length or
shortness of time).
44. Anything appearing as a certain truth to the mind, stamps the same
impression in the soul, as the sense of some golden jewellery, becomes
more impressive in the soul than the idea of its gold. (The fallacy of
our perceptions, creating errors in the judgement of the understanding).
45. There is nothing as a moment or an age or as near or afar to the
soul; it is the conception in the minute intellect (or the working of
the mind), that creates their length or brevity and their nearness and
remoteness. (As a year of men is a day of Gods, and such a year of these
makes a day of Brahmá; while there is no measure of time or space in the
infinity of the Divine mind).
46. The contraries as light and darkness, nearness and distance, and a
moment and an age, being but varied impressions on the unvaried
percipient mind, have no real difference in them. (They are as unreal as
the various evanescent hues of the recipient and reflexive clouds. So no
colour is real chromatics or Science of colours).
47. All things or objects which are perceptible to the senses, are
called to be evident or apparent; and those which lie beyond them, are
said to be imperceptible or unapparent. But visual sensation is not
selfevident, except the vision of the intellect, which is the real
essence. (In answer to the question “What is perceptible and unreal?”
Answer—All what is apparent, is untrue).
48. As long as there is the knowledge of the jewel, there is the
knowledge of the gem also; that of the real gem, being lost under the
apparent form. (So reliance on ocular evidence, presents an obstruction
to the vision of the intellect).
49. It is by reversion of the attention from the visible form of the
jewel to the real essence of the gem, that one is led to the sight of
the pure light of the only One Brahma. (So says a poet:—Forsake the
visible to see the invisible).
50. Brahma is viewed as Sat or reality, when He is considered as
pervading all things; and He is said to be Asat or unreal, because He is
not the object of vision. So is the Intellect said to be a reality from
its faculty of intellection, otherwise it is a stolid or dull matter.
(Answers to “what reality appears as unreal, and what intellect as the
absence of intellect”).
51. The intellect is the wonderful property of the Divine Spirit, in
which it is present as its object (chetya); but how can a man have a
view of it, whose mind fixed to the sight of the world, which is a
shadow of the Intellect, and moves as a tree which is shaken by the
wind?
52. As a mirage is the reflexion of the dense light of the sun, so is
the world a shadow of the solid light of the Divine intellect.
53. That which is rarer than the rays of the sun and never decays, is
ever as uniform as it was before creation and disjoined from it. Hence
its existence is tantamount to its nonexistence.
54. As the accumulation of sunbeams, exhibits the formation of a gold
mine in the sky; so the golden appearance of the world, prevents the
deluded to look to the knowable object of the intellect.
55. Like the appearance of a visionary city in dream, the sight of this
world is neither a reality nor altogether unreal; because it is a
reflexion of the intellect, as the dream is that of images in the
memory. It is but a continued medley of error.
56. Knowing it as such, men should consider everything by the light of
reason; and proceed to the knowledge of truth by their intellectual
culture.
57. There is no difference between a house and a void, than that the one
is the object of vision, and the other of consciousness. Again all
nature teeming with life, is said to live in God, who is light and life
of all for evermore.
58. But all these living beings have no room in the empty sphere of
Divine Intellect. They live and shine like the solar rays, proceeding
imperceptibly from that luminous orb.
59. There appears a difference in these rays both from the original
light, and also from one another (in different beings), by a curious
design of Providence; but it is yet the same in all, like the forms of
the trees growing out of the same kind of seed.
60. As the tree contained in the seed, is of the same kind with the
parent seed; so the innumerable worlds contained in the vacuous seed of
Brahma, are also void and vacuum as Brahma himself.
61. As the tree which is yet undeveloped in the seed, is not _in esse_
without development of its parts; (so the world in the womb of Brahma,
was discernible only to the Divine Intellect; in the form of the ideal
or spiritual world to be _in futuro_).
62. There is but one God, who is one and increate, calm and quiet,
without beginning, middle or end, and without a body and its parts. He
has no duality and is one in many. He is of the form of pure light, and
shines for ever with everlasting and undiminished lustre.