The Tattva-Muktavali | Page 3

all desire; but thou art within the range of speech and of thought; how shall there be oneness of thee and Brahman?
14. Thou art verily bereft of thy understanding, O individual Soul, by the darkness of this doctrine of Maya, while thou constantly proclaimest like a madman "I am Brahman"; where is thy sovereignty, where thy empire, where thy omniscience? There is as vast a difference between Brahman and thee as between mount Meru and a mustard-seed!
15. Thou art a finite soul, He is indeed all-pervading; thou standest only on one spot, while He is everywhere always; thou, being of a moment, art happy and unhappy; He is happy at all times; how canst thou say "I am He"? Fie! art thou not ashamed?
16. Glass is glass, and a gem is a gem; a shell is but a shell, and silver is silver; there is never seen a transposition [Footnote: Dr. Banerjea (__Dialogues__, p. 379) reads __kadapy atyayaj?anam, i.e.__ vyabhichara; but all the MSS. which I have compared read __na kada vyatyaya__ (or __vyatyaya.m__) __j?anam; kada__ seems irregularly used for __kadapi__, as it is also in ?l. 113, __c.__] among them. But wherever other things are imagined, to be found in something else, it is through an error; and so it is when the soul utters such words as "that art thou!"
17. The meaning of the word "__that__" (__tat__) is an ocean of immortality, filled with manifest and supreme felicity; the meaning of the word "__thou__" is a most miserable being, bewildered in mind through the burden of the fear of existence; these two can never be one, they are divided by the nature of things; the doctrine of Non-unity is the truth for all worlds, thou art but His slave.
18. If Brahman were meant by these words, the power employed would not be Denotation, for their literal meaning does not apply; [Footnote: In such sentences as "That art thou," "I am Brahman," etc., the primary power of the words, __i.e.__ " Denotation" (__abhidha__), could not express the unconditioned Brahman destitute of all attributes; for Denotation rests upon the ordinary conventional meaning, and how could this take in an idea so far removed from ordinary experience? Nor could it be the secondary power "Indication" (__laksha.na__), as in the well- known instance of "the herd-station on the Ganges," where the Ganges, by "indication," means the shore and not the stream. For "indication" must be based on some connexion between the primary and the indicated secondary meaning; but how can that which is "without a second" be connected with anything?] consequently it must be the second power of a word, Indication.
19. Yet if so, why should it be Indication? for this arises from some association with the primary meaning; but with what can that substance be associated which is disconnected with everything and without a second?
20. That power of a word is Indication, by which, when the primary meaning is precluded, some other meaning is indicated in connexion therewith, through some motive or through common currency; and its causes are thus three [Footnote: I suppose that these are (1) the incompatibility of the primary sense; (2) the common currency of the secondary meaning, __e.g.__ when "Europe" is used to imply its inhabitants in the phrase "Europe makes war:" (3) a motive, as in "a herd-station on the Ganges," where "Ganges" is used instead of "the bank of the Ganges," in order to imply the coolness and purity of the spot].
21. Now if there is no Denotation in a phrase, how can there arise any Indication? First there should be some primary meaning precluded, and then there may be the Indication of something else.
22. Where there is no accepted Denotation, how can you there have Indication? If there is no village, how can there be a boundary?-- there is no child without a father [Footnote: Cf. the Bengali proverb __matha nai tar mathabyatha__, "he has no head and yet he has a headache."]
23. "The lances enter, the swords, the bows and arrows,"--here we have Indication; for the sentence must suggest something else to complete itself, as there cannot be "entrance" in the case of an inanimate subject.
24. "A herd-station on the Ganges,"--here we have the self-sacrifice of the primary to another meaning, since the Ganges, as being in the form of water, cannot be the site of a herd-station.
25. In the example "gh? is life" there is produced the idea of sameness of form; in the example "this is life" there arises the idea of identity [Footnote: In the first ex. there is __?uddha- saropa-laksha.na__ or "pure superimponent indication," in the second there is __?uddha-sadhyavasana-l.__ or "pure introspeceptive indication," where the gh? is swallowed up in the "life." Most writers, however, disallow __upachara__ in __?uddha-laksha.na__]; but the knowledge of the meaning of the