RESOLUTION OF DUALITY INTO UNITY.
Argument.--Unity, the source, substance, and ultimum of plurality,
which is resolved to unity. The Doctrine of monotheism. One in all and
all into one.
Vasishtha said:--Tell me, my lord, that bearest the crescent of
the moon on thy fore-head, how the pure and simple essence of the
intellect, which is an infinite unity and ever uniform and immutable
in its nature, is transmuted to the finite dualities of the variable
and impure soul and mind. (Moreover the whole equal to a part is quite
absurd and impossible).
2. Tell me, O great god! how this uncaused prime cause, becomes
diffused in endless Varieties, and how can we get rid of the plurality
of our creeds by our wisdom, for putting an end to our miseries. (By
means of our belief in the true unity).
3. The god replied--When the omnipotent God (sad), remains as one unity
of immensity (Eka Brahma); it is then of course absurd, to speak of his
duality or plurality, and of the manifestation of a part or minim of
himself. (The whole cannot be a part).
4. Taking the monad for a duad, is to ascribe duality to unity; and
the imputation of dualism or bipartition to the simple intellect,
is wholly futile from its nature of indivisibility. (So says the
sruti: The one is no dual nor a bipartite thing. In Him there is no
plurality, diversity or any particularity whatever. [Sanskrit: natu
taddvitíyamasti tati-nya hvibhaktam | nanuneha nánástikincana.])
5. The want of the number one, causes the absence both of unity,
duality; because there can be no dual without the singular, nor a
single one unless there be the number two above it. (_i.e._ There can
be no duality without the prime and preceding unity; nor even the unity
unless it is followed by duality; because the prime number would be
indefinite and indetermined without the succeeding ones).
6. The cause and its effect being of one nature (or essence), they are
both of the same kind, as the fruit and the seed contained in it. The
difference which is attributed to them from the change of one thing to
the other, is a mere fiction of imagination.
7. The mind itself evolves in its thoughts at its own will; the changes
occurring in itself, are no way different from its own nature; as the
mutual productions of seed and fruit, are of the same nature, the same
fruit produces the same seeds, and these again bring forth the same
fruits &c. (So the mind and its thoughts, are the same things and of
the self-same nature).
8. Many modifications incessantly rise in the infinite mind of the
almighty Maker as its eternal will, and these taking place in actu in
positive existences, and substantive forms bear the relation of causes
and their effects in this world.
9. These productions are likened to the waves of waters in the sea, and
mirage to the progeny of a barren woman, and the horns of a hare--all
which are _nil_ and not in being. They are all as negative as the
water on the mountaintop, and as the barley corn growing on the head
of a hare. (In all these instances the producer or container is a
reality; but the produced or contained waves etc. are false; and so is
Brahma the producer and container of all as positive entity, but the
production of the world is null and void).
10. Herein enquiring into the real truth, we must refrain from
logomachy; and find that though all things tend to stablish the unity,
yet it is difficult even in thought to do away with the difference of
things, as that of words and their senses. (that is to say, though
unity is the result of right reason, yet duality is inseparable from
common sense).
11. The essence of divine omnipotence, is not divisible into portions
or their fractions, like the waves of the sea, that are broken into
bubbles and particles of waters.
12. As the leaves and stalks and branches and flowers of trees, are no
other than the same substance; so unity and duality, meity and tuity
and the objectivity of the phenomenal world, are not different from
the essence of the subjective intellect, which contains and puts forth
itself in all these forms.
13. All time and place and variety of figures and forms, being but
modifications of the intellect, it is improper for us to question the
reality of those, and assert the certainty of this intellect.
14. The entities of time and space, and the powers of action and
destiny (divine ordinance), are all derived from and directed by the
intellect and bear their intellectual natures also.
15. As the power of thinking, the thought and its object, jointly
compose the principle of mind; so the whole universe and every thing
that bears a name, are all included under the term chit or intellect;
as the water and its rise and fall, are all included under the word
wave.
16. The thoughts which continually rise and fall, in the great ocean
of the intellect; are like the waves which heave and set down, on the
surface of the boisterous sea.
17. It is this supreme intellect which is known by the various
appellations of the Lord, God, Truth, Siva and others; as also by the
various names of vacuum, unity and the supreme spirit.
18. Such is the nature of God, whom no words can express; and who is
styled the Ego or the subjective "I am that I am" and whom it is beyond
the power of speech to describe.
19. All that is seen all around, are but the leaves, fruits, flowers
and branches of the all creeping plant of the intellect; which being
diffused in all, leaves nothing that is different from it.
20. The divine intellect [Sanskrit: chit] being omniscient [Sanskrit:
mahávidyá] has the great nescience or ignorance [Sanskrit: mahá avidyá]
underlying it (as the lighted lamp is accompanied by the shadow under
it); and then looking at this side of itself it takes the name of the
living soul, and beholds this shadowy world stretched outside the
divine mind, as we see another moon in the reflexion of that luminary,
cast upon a nebular circle beyond it.
21. Then thinking itself as another or a living being _Jíva_, and other
wise than what it is (_i.e._ the immortal spirit paramátma); it becomes
just of the same nature, as it thinks and forms itself by its own will.
22. Being thus transformed from its perfect and immaculate state, to
that of an imperfect and impure nature; it is made to wade amidst the
stream of this world, without ever thinking (of its fall from the state
of original purity).
23. The intellectual form being then assimilated with the elemental
(puryashtaka) body, receives its vital or mortal life and living soul,
which lives by reflexion of the essence of the supreme intellect.
24. The spiritual body is also transformed to the frail living body,
which being joined with quintessence of quintuple elements, comes to
know itself as material substance (dravymas miti).
25. This substance being next infused with the vital breath, receives
soon after its vigor and strength like the seed of a plant; and then it
feels itself to be endued with life, and to be conceived in the uterus
in its own conception.
26. The same erroneous conception of its gross materiality, misleads
to the belief of its own egoism and personality. It conceives also its
state of a moving or unmoving being, and this conception of it converts
it instantly into the like form. (We have the forms, as we picture to
ourselves in our minds).
27. Again the simultaneous meeting of former reminiscence with the
later desire of a person, changes its former habitual and meaner
form, to that of a larger and grosser kind. (Thus one that had been
a contemptible gnat in its previous state of existence, is come to a
big elephant in its next birth, not from its remembrance of its former
state of life, but from its settled desire of becoming the would be
being in the next. So it is the will [Sanskrit: vásaná] that supersedes
the former impression [Sanskrit: samskára] of what one had been before,
and transforms it to what it wishes to be afterwards. Hence the will is
the parent of thoughts).
28. The difference and duality of one from its identity and unity, are
results of one's thinking himself other wise than what he really is;
as a man becomes a devil by thinking himself possessed by a ghost.
29. The thought of the duality of one self-same soul, in its two
aspects of the supreme and human souls; is driven away by the
persuasion that I do nothing, and the agency of all actions rests in
the great God himself.
30. The unity is considered as a duality, by the dualistic opinions
of men; while on the other hand the belief in unity, destroys the
conviction of dualism and plurality from the minds of men.
31. There is no duality or secondary being in the soul, which may be
regarded as the supreme soul, because there is but one soul only, which
is unchangeable and unperishable at all times and every where. (All
other changing and finite beings, are but reflexions of the supreme).
32. All works of imagination are dispersed, with the dispersion of the
fumes of fancy; as one's aerial castle and the fairy city, vanish after
the flight of the phrenzy and the visionary dream.
33. It is painful to raise a fabric of imagination, but there is no
pain whatever in breaking it down; because the chimera of imagination
is well skilled in building the aerial cities, and not in demolishing
them. (Which belongs to the province of reason only).
34. If the fullness of one's desires and fancies, is fraught with the
pains and troubles of life, it must be the want of such wishes and
views, that will serve to set him free from these pains for ever.
35. If even a slight desire is enough to expose a man to many cares in
life, then its utter privation must afford him complete rest and quiet,
in his transient state of being.
36. When your mind has got loose, from the manifold folds of your
serpentine desires; you will then come to enjoy the sweets of the
garden of paradise. (Had it not been for the serpent's insinuation to
taste the fatal fruit, our first parents would be left to enjoy all the
sweets of Paradise).
37. Drive away and disperse the clouds of your desire, by the breeze
of your reason; and come and enjoy your rest, under the calm and clear
autumnal sky of your indifference--_nonchalance_.
38. Dry the impetuous current of your rapid desires, by the charms of
amulets and mantras; and then restrain yourself from being borne away
by the flood, and restrict your mind to its dead inaction.
39. Rely thy trust in the intellectual soul _chidátmá_, seated in the
cavity of thy heart, and look on mankind driven to and fro by the
gusts of their desire, like fragments of straw flying at random in the
perturbed air.
40. Wash out the dirt of thy desires from thy mind, by the pure water
of thy spiritual knowledge; and after securing the perfect tranquillity
of thy soul, continue to enjoy the highest bliss of a holy life.
41. God is all powerful and omnipresent, and displays himself in
all forms every where (He is seen in the same manner as one desires
to behold him in a temporal or spiritual light. [Sanskrit: vrashma
káranena bhogmakáranena bá yathá bhávayate tatha pashyati]).
42. It is the thought or imagination, that makes the false world appear
as true; and it depends upon the thought also, that the world vanishes
into nothing. (The existence and inexistence of the world; depend alike
on the thoughts of divine and human minds; the positive and negative
are all creations of the mind).
43. It is the net work of our thoughts and desires, that is interwoven
with the threads of our repeated births; but the winds of our apathy
and indifference blow off this web, and settle us in the state of
supreme felicity.
44. Avarice is a thorny plant, that has taken deep root in the human
heart; it is fostered under the shade of the arbor of desire, root out
this tree of desire, and the thorny bush of avarice will fade away of
itself.
45. The world is a shadow and a pseudoscope, and rises to view and
disappears by turns; it is an error of the brain that presents the
sight of the course of nature (sansriti), like that of the fairy land
presented to us in a dream.
46. The king that forgets his nature of the Lord, mistakes himself for
a prince, or that he is born or become the ruler of the land; this
concept of his which springs from ignorance of his divine nature,
vanishes soon after he comes to the real knowledge of himself.
47. The king in possession of his present royalty, has no reminiscence
of his past and former state; as we do not recollect the foulness of
the past rainy weather, in the serenity of the present autumn.
48. The thought that is predominant in the mind, naturally prevails
over the fainter and weaker ones, as the highest pitch in music
suppresses the _bass_ tones, and takes possession of the ear.
49. Think in yourself that you are one (unit or the unity), and that
you are the soul (or supreme soul); keep this single reflection before
you, and holding fast to it, you will become the object of your
meditation. (This is called [Sanskrit: átmapújá] spiritual adoration,
or assimilating one's self to the supreme soul).
50. Such is the spiritual meditation of spiritualists like yourself,
who aspire to the highest felicity of the supreme Being; while the
external form of worship, is fit only for ungoverned minds, that
rapt only for their temporal welfare. In formal worship composed of
the worshipper, the formalities of the ritual and the articles of
offerings, are symbolical of ignorant minds, and too insignificant to
the wise.