3. (Matter in its subtle state) subserves an end, on account of its
dependence on him (viz. the Supreme Person).
Matter in its subtle state subserves ends, in so far only as it is
dependent on the Supreme Person who is the cause of all. We by no means
wish to deny unevolved matter and all its effects in themselves, but in
so far only as they are maintained not to have their Self in the Supreme
Person. For the fact is that they constitute his body and He thus
constitutes their Self; and it is only through this their relation to
him that the Pradhâna, and so on, are capable of accomplishing their
several ends. Otherwise the different essential natures of them all
could never exist,--nor persist, nor act. It is just on the ground of
this dependence on the Lord not being acknowledged by the Sânkhyas that
their system is disproved by us. In Scripture and Smriti alike, wherever
the origination and destruction of the world are described, or the
greatness of the Supreme Person is glorified, the Pradhâna and all its
effects, no less than the individual souls, are declared to have their
Self in that Supreme Person. Compare, e.g. the text which first says
that the earth is merged in water, and further on 'the elements are
merged in the Mahat, the Mahat in the Unevolved, the Unevolved in the
Imperishable, the Imperishable in Darkness; Darkness becomes one with
the highest divinity.' And 'He of whom the earth is the body,' &c. up to
'he of whom the Unevolved is the body; of whom the Imperishable is the
body; of whom death is the body; he the inner Self of all beings, free
from all evil, the divine one, the one God Nârâyana.' And Earth, water,
fire, air, ether, mind, intellect, egoity--thus eightfold is my nature
divided. Lower is this nature; other than this and higher know that
nature of mine which has become the individual soul by which this world
is supported. Remember that all beings spring from this; I am the origin
and the dissolution of the whole Universe. Higher than I there is none
else; all this is strung on me as pearls on a thread' (Bha. Gî VII, 4-7).
And 'the Evolved is Vishnu, and the Unevolved, he is the Person and time.--
The nature (prakriti) declared by me, having the double form of the
Evolved and the Unevolved, and the soul-both these are merged in the
highest Self. That Self is the support of all, the Supreme Person who
under the name of Vishnu is glorified in the Vedas and the Vedânta books.'
4. And on account of there being no statement of its being an object of
knowledge.
If the text meant the Non-evolved as understood by the Sânkhyas it would
refer to it as something to be known; for the Sânkhyas, who hold the
theory of Release resulting from the discriminative knowledge of the
Evolved, the Non-evolved, and the soul, admit that all these are objects
of knowledge. Now our text does not refer to the Un-evolved as an object
of knowledge, and it cannot therefore be the Pradhâna assumed by the
Sânkhyas.
5. Should it be said that (the text) declares (it); we say, not so; for
the intelligent Self (is meant), on account of subject-matter.
'He who has meditated on that which is without sound, without touch,
without form, without decay, without taste, eternal, without smell,
without beginning, without end, beyond the Great, unchangeable; is freed
from the jaws of death' (Ka. Up. II, 3,15), this scriptural text,
closely following on the text under discussion, represents the
'Unevolved' as the object of knowledge!--Not so, we reply. What that
sloka represents as the object of meditation is (not the Unevolved but)
the intelligent Self, i.e. the Supreme Person. For it is the latter who
forms the general subject-matter, as we infer from two preceding
passages, viz. 'He who has knowledge for his charioteer, and who holds
the reins of the mind, he reaches the end of his journey, the highest
place of Vishnu'; and 'That Self is hidden in all beings and does not
shine forth, but it is seen by subtle seers through their sharp and
subtle intellect.' For this reason, also, the clause 'Higher than the
person there is nothing' cannot be taken as meant to deny the existence
of an entity beyond the 'purusha' in the Sânkhya sense. That the highest
Self possesses the qualities of being without sound, &c., we moreover
know from other scriptural texts, such as Mu. Up. I, 1, 6 'That which is
not to be seen, not to be grasped,' &c. And the qualification 'beyond
the Great, unchangeable' is meant to declare that the highest Self is
beyond the individual Self which had been called 'the Great' in a
previous passage 'beyond the intellect is the Great Self.'