:00
loo
= 00
= oo
•CD
CO
:
SHASTRI INDO-CANADIAN INSTITUTE
156 Golf Links,
New Delhi -3, India
s
S'S'i^lBf
Digitized by the Internet Archive
in 2008 with funding from
IVIicrosoft Corporation
http://www.archive.Ofg/details/brahmajijnasaori00tattuoft
BRAHMAJIJNASA
OR
An Inquiry into fclie Philosophical Basis of Theism
BY THE SAME AUTHOR
1. The Vedanta and its Eelation to Modern
Thought : Twelve lectures on the religion and philo-
sophy of the L'panishads and the Vedanta Sutras. Rs. 2-4.
2. The Philosophy of Brahmaism : Twelve lectures
on Brahma doctrine, scidhan and social ideals. Rs. 2-8.
3- Krishna and the Gita : Twelve lectures on the
authorship, philosophy and religion of the Bhagavadgita.
Rs. 2-8.
4. Brahmasadhan or Endeavours after the Life
Divine: Twelve lectures on spiritual life. Re. 1-8.
j^*" To be had of the author at 210/3/2, Comwallis
Street, Calcutta. For other works please see the end.
BRAHMAJIJNASA
OR
An Inquiry into the Philosophical Basis of Theism
f Translated from the original Bengali, with
supplementary chapters
BY
SITANATH TATTVABHUSHAN
Headmaster, Kesav Academy ; Sometime Lecturer in
Philosophy, City College, Calcutta
Rs. 1-8 or 2s.
Tass
nib
KUNTALINE PRESS
61, BowBAZAR Street, Calcutta;
Printed & published by P. C. Dass.
PREFACE
Bvahmajijndsd in Bengali was first published
m 1888. A revised edition, in which many-
additions and alterations were made, but the
central doctrine remained unchanged, came out
Errata — On p. ii, 1. 19, read ' authors ' tor ' author s,' and 01
p. iii, 1. 21, read " first and second "' for " second and third.'
whom he is proud to count Raja Venkatakumar
Mahipati Surya Rao of Pithapuram and the
worthy Principal of the Pithapuram Raja's
College at Cocanada, Rao Bahadur Venkata-
ratnam, m.a., l.t. According to the repeatedly
expressed wishes of the latter and through the
generous pecuniary support of the former, Brahma-
jijndsd was translated by the author in 191 2- 13
and now comes out in its new dress with three
PREFACE
Brahma jijndsd in Bengali was first published
in 1888. A revised edition, in which many
additions and alterations were made, but the
central doctrine remained unchanged, came out
in igii. The theory defended and expounded
in the book underlies every work written by the
author since its first publication. It has therefore
been a matter of regret to him that while most
of his works are in English, the book containing
a detailed exposition of the philosophical views
presupposed in them should remain in a pro-
vincial language unknown to his non-Bengali
readers. This regret was shared by some of the
readers and admirers of his English works, among
whom he is proud to count Raja Venkatakumar
Mahipati Surya Rao of Pithapuram and the
worthy Principal of the Pithapuram Raja's
College at Cocanada, Rao Bahadur Venkata-
ratnam, m.a., l.t. According to the repeatedly
expressed wishes of the latter and through the
generous pecuniary support of the former, Brahma-
jijndsd was translated by the author in 191 2- 13
and now comes out in its new dress with three
11
supplementary chapters recently written. The
author's debt of gratitude to the Raja Saheb for
the liberal support given to all his later literary
efforts was already immense, and is now immeasur-
ably enhanced by this last act of kindness, which
has enabled him to give a much needed com-
pletion to the little system of Theistic Theology
contained in his works. Of that system the
present book gives the metaphysical basis, the
Philosophy of Brahma ism shows the doctrinal,
ethical and social development, Brahmasddhan
indicates the sddhans or spiritual exercises, and
the Vedanta and its Relation to Modern Thought
and Krishna and the Gitd define the relation to the
elder Theism of the country as presented in the
Prasthdnatrayam, the three Vedantic institutes.
The author's intellectual debt will be some-
what evident from the names of books and
author's given in the foot-notes. The central
doctrine will be found to be, in its essence, the
Theism of the Upanishads, and in its method, the
Neo-Hegelianism of British Idealists. But both
in the exposition and elaboration of the doctrine
the author will be found to have departed largely
from the Vedantists of both the chief schools —
those of Sankara and Ramanuja, — as well as
from the British Neo-Hegelians. This departure
Ill
will be found chiefly in the third and fourth
chapters. The Idealists, though recognising an
•element of difference in the fundamental Unity,
make little of it, while the Vedantists of Sankara's
school ignore it altogether, and the followers of
Ramanuja do little more than assert it dogmati-
cally on the authority of the scriptures. The
author of this book has tried to put the proper
emphasis on it and to show its bearing on the
doctrine of an ever-active God of love essential
to all true Theism.
The Natural Theology of the West recognises
three arguments for Theism, (i) the Cosmological
or Causal, (2) the Teleological, and (3) the Ontolo-
gical. Some theologians recognise a fourth, the
Moral. The first three chapters of the book will
be found to be one long exposition of the third
argument, which, according to Hegel, is the only
real argument, and the fourth chapter is devoted
to an exposition of the fourth argument. The
second and third arguments, as not strictly
philosophical, find no place in the original
Brahma jijndsd. But as popular arguments, help-
ful to the unphilosophical mind, and as steps
leading to the Ontological Argument, they are
given in the supplementary chapter on the
" Theistic Presuppositions of Science." The two
IV
other supplementary chapters give brief accounts
of some of the chief systems of British and
American thought that have appeared or become
prominent since the book was first published.
They were written as articles for a weekly paper
and were not intended to form parts of a book on
Philosophy. But it is hoped that they will not
fail to prove suggestive and lead to more serious
studies on the subjects touched upon in them.
Though deeply conscious of its defects and
imperfections, the author yet humbly commends
Brahmajijndsd to students of Philosophy with
the hope that it may, under divine blessing,
introduce them to higher and deeper studies in
Metaphysics and Theology and awaken in them
an aspiration after communion with the God
who loves and lives in all.
Calcutta,
August, 1916.
CONTENTS
Chapters and Sections Page
Chapter I : The Self and the Not-self ... i — 89
Section i — Self-consciousness and object-con-
sciousness ... ... I — 18
Section 2 — Mind and Matter ... ... 18 — 57
Section 3 — Refutation of Naturalism ... 58 — 75
Section 4 — Knowledge and the Senses ... 76 — 81
Section 5 — The Self — Universal and Individual 82 — 89
Chapter II : The Temporal axd the Eternal 90 — 145
Section i — Sensationalism and Subjective
Idealism ... ... 90 — 100
Section 2 — Knowledge a Unity-in-difference 100 — 107
Section 3 — Knowledge and Will ... 108 — 112
Section 4 — Time and Events ... ... 112 — 121
Section 5 — Knowledge and Time ... 121 — 129
Section 6 — The Omniscience of God ... 129 — 140
Section 7 — The Mystery of Creation ... 140 — 145
Chapter III: Unity and Difference .,. 146 — 167
Section i — The Unity and Infinitude of God 146 — 150
Section 2 — Unity-in-difference ... ... 150 — 157
Section 3 — Dualism, Monism and the Doc-
trine of Unity-in-difference ... 157 — 167
Chapter IV : The Perfect and the Imperfect 168 — 198
Section i — The Divine Love and Holiness ... 168 — 180
Section 2 — God's Love to Individuals ... 180 — 188
Section 3 — The Mystery of Evil ... 188 — 198
11
Chapter A : Theistic Presupppositions of
Science ... ... igg — 231
Chapter B : Mr. Bradley on the Divine Person-
ality ... ... ... 232 — 239
Chapter C : Monism, Pluralism and their Re-
conciliation ... ... 240 — 256
#
CHAPTER I
THE SELF AND THE NOT-SELF
Section i — Self-consciousness and object-
consciousness
At the very commencement of our discussion
I beg the reader to retire to a solitary place and
meditate on the self. Let him draw away his
mind, so far as he can, from external objects, and
stop the activity of his senses — cease to see, hear
and touch. Let all thoughts of external objects
also cease and let the mind be quiet and at rest.
Perhaps, even when all other objects have moved
away from the mind, one will still remain —
darkness or the thought of darkness. That how-
ever will not make much difference. Now, in
this dark, quiet, and lonely place, — in this calm,
unruffled state, — let the reader try to realise his
2 SELF-CONSCIOUS\ESS & OBJECT-CONSCIOUSXESS CHAP.
self. Let him now have a close vision of that
which he is apt to forget almost totally in his
absorption in external objects. Let him see
by introspection that though all external lights
are put out, the light of the self is not put
out. The self is shining by its own light and
lighting the darkness too. The self is conscious
of itself as the subject, the knower, and of the
darkness as the object, the known ; the self
reveals itself as consciousness. Let the reader
closely attend to this characteristic of the self, —
its consciousness. It has other characteristics
also, but they all depend upon this — they all
shine in its light.* Consciousness is the very
life of the self, it is consciousness itself. Hence-
forth we shall often speak of the self as only
consciousness. However, let the reader see now,
that in this fundamental characteristic of the
self, — consciousness, — there is a sort of distinction
or difference — a difference, as it were, of the
root and the branch, of the support and the sup-
ported. That the self knows itself — its self-cons-
ciousness— is the fundamental fact, while its know-
ledge of the object, darkness, depends on its self-
* ' Tasya bhdsd sarvam idam vibhdti ' — Miindaka Upa-
nishad, II. 2. 10.
SELF-COXSCIOUSXESS FUNDAMENTAL
consciousness. The self cannot know darkness
without knowing itself. Not that the self knows
itself first and the next moment knows darkness.
The fact is that the self knows itself and darkness
at once, by the same undivided act of knowing.
Nevertheless self-consciousness is the essential
* condition and ground of the consciousness of
darkness. To be conscious of darkness, one
must necessarily be conscious of one's self : dark-
ness cannot be known without the knowledge of
the self. It is not possible to know mere dark-
ness. In the knowledge of darkness the whole
content of knowledge involved is / know darkness.
Darkness cannot be known without the knowing
"I." If the reader doubts this, he may try if he
can think of darkness without thinking of his
self. If he says, "Yes, I perceived darkness with-
out knowing my self ; when I perceived darkness,
I did not know my self," then I shall put two
questions to him. You say that when you
perceived darkness you did not know your own
self, did not know the knower, — the fact 'I know'
was not included in the content of your know-
ledge. All right ; let me take this for granted.
But I ask you — What is the proof of your having
perceived darkness ? You will say that the proof is
remembrance, — that it lies in the fact that. you
4 SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS & OBJECT-CONSCIOUSNESS CHAP.
remember to have perceived darkness. Well,
then the content of your remembrance is this —
' I then knew darkness,' that is, ' I knew ' + ' dark-
ness ' are the two indivisible contents of your
remembrance. You must admit that nothing
can be remembered that was not once known,
that it is only things known that can be remem-'
bered. What is remembered must once have
been known. Therefore, as you remember ' I
knew,' this fact must have been known to you,
that is, at the time of knowing darkness, 'I know'
must have formed a content of your knowledge.
And yet you said a moment before that you per-
ceived mere darkness, — that at the time you per-
ceived darkness you had no knowledge of your self
— that ' I know ' formed no content of your know-
ledge. The reader sees then that to think that
darkness can be known without knowing the
self is only the result of inadvertence. To know
darkness, one must necessarily know the self ;
self-consciousness is the condition and support
of the consciousness of darkness, — the knowledge
of darkness is absolutely impossible without the
knowledge of the self.
Let us now proceed a little further. Let the
reader open his eyes and look at some object.
Suppose he sees a piece of paper, the white colour
ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE TRUTH
of which has taken the place of darkness. It may
seem that immediately on opening the eyes,
immediately on looking at the paper, he has
reached the external world and gone entirely out
of the inner world, the world of the self. But
^the fact is not so : he has not gone an inch out
of the impassable limits of self-consciousness.
Whatever we have said of the knowledge of
darkness, is true also of this knowledge of colour.
He will see that in knowing this colour too, he
must necessarily know the self that knows it.
As self-consciousness is the necessary support of
the consciousness of darkness, so is it of the
consciousness of colour ; the latter is not a bit
more independent than the former. The know-
ledge of colour is impossible without the know-
ledge of the self. In the knowledge of colour,
the whole content involved is " I know colour."
If the reader has any doubt of the matter, he has
only to apply the test already proposed, and he
will see that to suppose that the knowledge of
colour is possible without the knowledge of self,
is an inadvertence.
The reader may replace this knowledge of
colour by the knowledge of any other object he
pleases, but he will see that whatever the object
may be, the consciousness of it is invariably
6 SELF-CONSCIOUSXESS & OBJECT-CONSCIOUSNESS CHAP.
accompanied with self-consciousness, forming its
support and making it possible. Self-conscious-
ness is the universal principle that remains
constant in the midst of the changes of object-
consciousness : nothing can enter into conscious-
ness without being conditioned by it. We
cannot know anything else without knowing " I
know ; " we cannot remember anything without
remembering " I knew ; " and we cannot antici-
pate any future knowledge without thinking
" I shall know." All knowledge is winded, as
it were, with the thread of self-knowledge ; the
whole structure of knowledge stands on the
ground-work of self-knowledge. The truth of
this principle is not confined to the particular
examples of it we have given. It is not a parti-
cular truth confined to particular cases : it is a
universal and necessary truth. As the properties
of all circles are evident from particular circles,
as those of all triangles are exemplified by parti-
cular triangles, so is the common characteristic
of all forms of knowledge revealed in particular
forms. As every circle requires a centre, as a
circle without a centre is impossible, so is a piece
of knowledge impossible without self-knowledge.
The reader may now open all the gates of
knowledge, — all his senses — and perceive various
I SELF-CONSCIOUSKESS UNIVERSAL AND NECESSARY 7
objects in nature. In doing this, he will see that
all objects are full of the light of the self. He
will see that the light of self-knowledge is on all
forms of knowledge — that it is that light by
which all objects are revealed. With all the
objects he sees is involved the truth " I see ; "
with all he hears, " I hear ; " with all he touches,
" I touch ; " in a word, with all that he knows,
he knows the fundamental truth, " I know." Let
the reader clearly realise this truth. It may now
seem to be trivial, but he will see by and by that
it is really the basis of our knowledge of God.
As a self-evident truth, we merely state and
expound it ; we make no attempt to prove it. As
the basis and proof of all other truths, it is really
above proof. We have seen how, by attempting
to deny this self-evident truth, we are involved
in inconsistencies and self-contradictions — how,
by denying something for a moment, we are
obliged to admit it in a manner the next moment.
It is needless to say anything more on the sub-
ject. To say that we know something, but do
not know ourselves as knowers, is to say that we
acquire a piece of knowledge, but do not know it
as ours. One who says this may be asked, — if in
acquiring the piece of knowledge he does not
know it as his, why does he believe it as his the
8 SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS & OBJECT-CONSCIOUSNESS CHAP.
next moment ? And why does he attempt to get
it recognised as such ? Whence comes this un-
shaken belief in a matter which he did not know
directly and of which he does not possess, — what
is not possible — any indirect proof ? If we were
to say to the objector that whatever knowledge
he is said to have acquired without self-knowledge
is not really his, what could he answer? We
could indeed very well say so, for the objector
himself says that in acquiring that knowledge he
did not know it as his, and he cannot say that
he remembers it as his, for what was not known
at all, cannot be remembered, — what was never
eaten cannot be ruminated. That we claim our
knowledge as ours, depends upon the invulnerable
proof that in acquiring every piece of knowledge
we have known it to be ours, that we have
acquired not a bit of knowledge without self-
knowledge and do not consider such unconscious
acquisition of knowledge as possible.*
The reader may ask, ' If it be really true that
self-consciousness accompanies every other form
of consciousness, that so long as we are conscious
we are also self-conscious, how is it that the very
* See Ferrier's Institutes of Metaphysic, Prop. I, and
Sankara's Commentary on the Brahmasutras, II. 3.7.
I INTUITIVE & REFLECTIVE KNOWLEDGE DISTINGUISHED 9
Opposite of this seems to be true ? How is it
that we seem to forget the self in our absorption
in the knowledge of some particular object ? The
source of the error is this. To know something
and to think that we know it, — to understand
that we know it,— are two very different things.
Knowing is often a matter of direct perception,
insight or introspection, while understanding is
always the result of reflection, of observation.
We have shown that no ki. iwledge is possible
without the knowledge of the self as the knower, —
without the knowledge of the piece of knowledge
as one's own. This self-consciousness, which lies
at the root of all consciousness of objects, is
direct knowledge. But to understand this truth
clearly is not the result of direct knowledge ; it
is the result of thought, — of reflective introspec-
tion, which is a difficult process, one which many
are quite incapable of going through. To make
the mind calm and quiet, to concentrate the
attention on the contents of knowledge, to
analyse them closely and describe them — is quite
impossible with many. And even those who are
capable of doing all this, do not do it always.
Even the most thoughtful philosopher has not
always the microscope of mental analysis ready
in hand. So it happens that though self-con-
lO SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS & OBJECT-CONSCIOUSNESS CHAP
sciousness (dtmajndna), which is direct know-
ledge, is involved in all forms of consciousness,
self-realisation (atmopalabdhi) or the reflective
knowledge of self, is not always possible. If
the reader understands this difference between
self-consciousness and self-realisation, he will see
why the truth under discussion does not always
seem to be true. Self-consciousness is fundament-
al, intuitive, spontaneous and universal ; it is
possessed by the thoughtful and the thoughtless
alike, and is present at all moments, reflective
and unreflective. But self-realisation is the result
of reflection, of self-examination ; it is possible
only to the thoughtful, and attainable only in
reflective moments. We spend most part of our
life without reflection, without self-examination ;
and so it seems to us that for most part of
our life we remain without self-knowledge —
without self-consciousness— and absorbed in
the consciousness of objects. But the fact is that
at such times though we are without self-realisa-
tion, we are not without self-consciousness. We
could not know anything without knowing " I
know," " the knowledge is mine."
We now proceed to expound another funda-
mental principle of knowledge and crave the
reader's close attention to it. He must have seen
I OBJ-CONSCIOUSNESS INVOLVED IN SUBJ-CONSCIOUSNESS II
that when he was trying to free the mind from
the knowledge and thought of objects, he did not
quite succeed in doing so. All objects of sense
must have moved away from his sphere of know-
ledge, the activity of all his senses must have
ceased, the thought of all external objects must
have stopped and the mind must have ceased to
be swayed by various feelings and become calm
and tranquil. Nevertheless, the thought of
objects cannot have been quite excluded. When
the thought of all other things had passed away
from the mind, darkness remained to keep com-
pany with the self. This darkness may not be
called a material object, but it is nevertheless
an object. Whether it is an external or an inter-
nal object, a material or a mental property, — we
at present say nothing as to that. It may here-
after be seen to be nothing independent of the self,
— nothing that can exist apart from the self ; but
what we say at present is only this, that it is an
object, not the subject, not the self, — that there
is a distinction, — a sort of duality — between it
and the self. In knowing darkness, the self
knows something which it can distinguish from
itself, and so it says that it knows itself and
darkness. If there were no distinction between
the self and darkness, the consciousness of self
12 SELF-CONSCrOUSKESS & OBJECT-CONSCIOUSNESS CHAP.
would pass away with the disappearance of the
consciousness of darkness, and it would be impos-
sible for the self to perceive the white colour and
other objects referred to by us. This proves that
though self-consciousness was manifested in con-
nection with the consciousness of objects when
the latter appeared, it is not one with it, — that
there is a difference between the two. So we said
that though darkness is not a material object, it
is nevertheless an object, and as such distinguish-
able from the subject. What we have to say
now is that however the self may try to free
itself from the consciousness of objects, to isolate
itself, it is impossible for it to do so : some cons-
ciousness or thought of objects must necessarily
accompany its consciousness of itself. As we
have seen that self-consciousness is the necessary
condition of object-consciousness, that no cons-
ciousness of objects is possible without it, so is
it true that self-consciousness cannot manifest
itself without being accompanied with some
consciousness of objects — that the consciousness of
self is impossible without some object-conscious-
ness. The self cannot know itself without distin-
guishing itself from some object or other. The
difference between these two fundamental truths
is, that while self- consciousness is the invariable
I THE TWO FUNDAMENTAL TRUTHS DISTINGUISHED I3
condition and acconripaniment of all conscious-
ness of objects, — the self being known with the
knowledge of every object, — no particular object-
consciousness accompanies self-consciousness. It is
not necessary that any particular object or num-
ber of objects must be known with the self. The
fact is that the self cannot be known unless soTiie
object or other, whatever it may be, is known
with it. Perhaps, some reader will say that in
realising his self, in the way he is invited to do,
he can free himself from the consciousness of
darkness, — that darkness does not remain as an
object of his knowledge in that state of self-
realisation. Now, there is nothing surprising in
this. A man born blind has perhaps no idea
of darkness ; but perhaps he has a feeling of
touch instead of a feeling of darkness. Perhaps
he feels the touch of the seat he occupies, or
the memory of some touched or heard object
sticks to his mind. As to a man with eyes the
absence of light remains as an object of conscious-
ness in such a condition, so to a blind man the
absence of sound or touch perhaps remains as the
accompaninent of his lonely thought. The truth
is that whether it be something positive or nega-
tive, some external object or some feeling or
state of the mind, the thought of some action or
14 SELF-CONSCIOUSXESS & OBJECT-CONSCIOUSNESS CHAP
inaction — whatever has any distinction or differ-
ence from the self — must invariably accompany
the consciousness of self. Why the self cannot
know itself in isolation, the reader will under-
stand on a little reflection. What does the self
know itself to be ? It knows itself to be a knower.
Whatever object the self may know, it knows
itself with it as its knower. With whatever
object-consciousness its self- consciousness may be
manifested, the form of this self-consciousness is —
' I am the knower.' It is only as a knower that
the self knows itself. But the term ' knower ' is
relative ; it implies an object of knowledge. A
knower who knows nothing is unmeaning. But
cannot the self, it may be asked, know itself?
Yes, it can, we reply, but in knowing itself it
must know itself as possessing some characteris-
tic. It is not possible that it should know itself
and yet not know itself as so and so. But under
whatever characteristic it may know itself, it will
be seen that every one of these characteristics is
related to some object or other, — that unless some
object or other is known or thought of, that
characteristic cannot be known or thought of.
If the self thinks of itself as unextended, as space-
less, such thought is possible only in relation
to the thought of extended objects. If it thinks
I SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS RELATIVE 15
of itself as permane-nt, unchangeable, such thought
is possible only in relation to transient, change-
able objects. If it thinks of itself as one, such
thought is possible only in relation to the thought
of many objects. The reader, therefore, sees
that ' self-consciousness is impossible without
object-consciousness,' is also a fundamental truth.
As in trying to deny our first fundamental truth
we involve ourselves in self-contradiction, so is
it the case with this our second fundamental
truth. If any reader says that in a particular
moment he knew only his self, and not anything
else, then we ask him as before, What proof of
this do you offer ? Its only proof can be memory.
The reader remembers that in that particular
moment he knew only his self, and nothing else,
so that the whole content of his knowledge at
that moment was—' I know only myself + 1 know
nothing else.' The reader sees that the second
part of this piece of knowledge is involved in the
first ; we put it separately only to make it explicit.
That this piece of knowledge is not mere self-
consciousness, that the consciousness of an object
is involved in it, is also clear. That object is —
the feeling of the absence of anything else but
the self. This feeling itself is a form of object-
consciousness and as such is distinguishable from
l6 SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS & OBJECT-CONSCIOUSNESS CHAP.
self-consciousness. The reader therefore sees
that what he thought a moment before, namely
that he sometimes knows his self in isolation
from objects, is something absurd. The very
absence of objects cannot be felt without thinking
of some object or other. In thinking, ' I perceive
no object,' the self necessarily thinks of something
or other as representing the world of objects.
The sky, the earth, a tree, a piece of paper, a pen,
joy, sorrow — something or other like these must
be thought of, so that the thought ' I perceive
no object ' may be possible. We see, then, that
the knowledge or thought of some object is an
invariable and necessary condition of self-con-
sciousness, that the self cannot realise itself without
distinguishing itself from some object or other.
We have explained two fundamental laws
of knowledge. We have discussed as much of
Epistemology or the science of knowing as is
necessary for our present purpose. We shall now
take up Ontology or the science of being. Before
we take up this discussion, it seems necessary
to say a word or two on the relation of faith and
knowledge. Faith is of two kinds, — rational
faith and blind faith. Rational faith is faith
derived from knowledge, whatever may be the
method in which the latter may be acquired.
FAITH — BLIND AND RATIONAL 17
Such faith alone is real faith. It is the necessary
result of knowledge. It naturally follows know-
ledge and does not require the practice of any
austerities or any other spiritual exercise than
the acquisition of knowledge. There is another
^kind of faith which is not real faith, but only its
shadow or adumbration. It does not wait for
knowledge or understanding, but is the result
of tradition or sentiment. Far from depending
on knowledge or understanding, this blind faith
sticks even to suCh false things as cannot either
be known or thought of, and the thought of
which involves inconsistency and self-contradic-
tion. What cannot be known or thought of
cannot indeed be an object of real faith, and so
we have said that such faith is not real faith, but
only its shadow— only a make-belief. Such blind
faith perhaps exists in all persons more or less,
but a seeker after knowledge can never be con-
tented with it. If there is, among the readers of
this book, any one who is contented with such
faith, he may put down the book immediately,
for it is not intended for him. It is impossible
for such an one to acquire true knowledge. Even
if he proceeds to acquire knowledge, blind faith
will mislead him at every step. In whatever
disguise he may come, Mahiravana, the prince
l8 MIND AND MATTER CHAP.
of the nether regions, is a deadly enemy of
Rama and Lakshmana.* So, blind faith, whether
it calls itself common sense or spiritual ex-
perience, is a deadly enemy of all kinds of pure
knowledge, and therefore of the knowledge of
God. Let the reader who is prepared to accept
the witness of knowledge, and is satisfied with
knowledge alone, accompany us while we
proceed to seek the witness of God in our self-
consciousness and consciousness of objects.
Section 2 — Mind and Matter
Let us discuss the relation of the external
world to mind in the light of the truths ex-
plained in our first section. The reader has
already seen that every object of knowledge is
full of the light of the self and is really revealed by
that light. Let him now try to realise this truth
fully. What I have before me, — paper, ink,
inkpot, pen, table &c. — are all objects of my
* Mahiravana was a son of Ravana, King of Lanka,
[n the Ramayana by Ki'rtivasa he is represented as having
successively taken various disguises — those of Dasaratha
and Kausalya among others — in order to get entrance into
the room in which the princes were, in order to carry them
off to his regions. He at last succeeded in his attempt
under the form of Vibhishana, the princes' chief friend
and protector.
I RELATIVITY OF SUBJECT AND OBJFXT I9
sight, related to that form of knowledge which
is called visual perception. The pen, paper and
inkpot touched by me are related to my tactual
sense, — are objects of my sense of touch. In the
same manner, whatever I perceive by the other
senses I know to be closely related to conscious-
ness— to the conscious self. Even when I do not
perceive them, I can think of them, I can imagine
them, as existing only in relation to conscious-
ness. Thought or imagination can deal only
with materials supplied by perception. Imagina-
tion can variously manipulate the materials
supplied by perception— can combine or permute
them in various ways, but cannot create new
materials. The common characteristic of all
that we know of material objects — of their forms,
qualities, states, — is that they are known — objects
of the conscious self. Consequently, imagination
too can contemplate them only as objects of
the conscious self. If imagination could create
new materials, such materials also would be
nothing but objects imagined, — objects of the
imagining self, and not things unrelated to the
self — things independent of it. The reader there-
fore sees that things that we call material cannot
be known or thought of as unrelated to or
independent of the conscious self. Things known
20 MIND AND MATTER
can be distinguished, but not separated, from the
knower. The distinction is within, not without,
knowledge. The knowledge of what we call
matter is a relation of which one term is the
self as subject, and the other matter as object.
But this distinction or difference of subject and
object is a difference within knowledge and
has no place out of knowledge. Matter cannot
either be known or conceived out of this relation
— knowledge. It cannot be known or conceived
except as appearing to the self as the object of
its knowledge. Now, the conclusion from all
this is that what we cannot know and cannot
even conceive, is not worthy of being believed in,
and cannot really be believed in ; but neverthe-
less people think that they can and do believe
in it. The fact is that they do not believe in
it, but only think that they believe. Matter can
neither be known nor conceived as independent
of knowledge, — it is indissolubly related to the
self in knowledge and conception ; and yet people
think that in existence it is independent of
knowledge, — that it can exist without being the
object of any knowledge. Such thinking is mere
fancy ; mere senseless talk. How it originated
we shall explain later on. Let the reader only
understand now that it is a meaningless talk, a
CONTRADICTIONS IN POPULAR THINKING
groundless erroneous belief. We have already
shown how in entertaining it we involve our-
selves in inconsistency — in an actual contradic-
tion. However different material things may
be from one another, they have all this common
characteristic, that they are all known things.
What do I know of the pen in my hand ? I know
that it is something having colour, extension,
hardness, smoothness &c. But all these qualities
are dependent on knowledge. Colour is some-
thing that is seen and we can think of it only as
something seen. Similarly hardness and smooth-
ness are also known objects, — objects of touch,
and can be thought of only as such. In the
same manner, extension too is something known
by vision and touch and can be conceived only
as such an object of knowledge. Therefore, if we
were to believe something having these charac-
teristics as existing independently of knowledge —
existing without being known by me or any
other conscious being, we should have to believe
in this absurd and senseless proposition that a
seen thing exists unseen or that a touched
thing exists untouched. Popular thinking is
involved in such a net of error tiiat it accepts
even such absurd and contradictory propositions
as credible. The fact is that even when this pen
22 MIND AND MATTER
is absent from sense, people really think of it as
seen and touched, thought being impossible under
any other conditions. But because, apart from
the momentary sensuous knowledge of things,
they have no clear notion of an eternal know-
ledge, they are obliged to think that though the
pen exists, it is not the object of any knowledge —
not dependent on any conscious self. If the
reader takes a few examples like the one we have
used, and thinks a little on the subject, he will
see that the proposition, " A material thing exists
without being the object of any knowledge, —
independently of any knowing self " — is an ex-
tremely absurd and meaningless one. For a
material object, to exist is to be known, — its
existence consists in being known. To exist in
any other form, — to exist independently of a
knowing self — is for it impossible.
We shall take up one by one each quality
of matter and by a detailed discussion of them
and of the material 'substance' imagined by some
philosophers, we shall show that matter is not
anything independent of mind — that mind is the
support of matter. Before, however, we take up
that discussion, we shall show the cause of the
popular error about matter. The chief cause
of this error is a false notion of the nature of
I POPULAR XOTIOX OF THE SOUL 23
mind or the soul. To the uneducated and the
unreflective, the soul means the body : in
speaking of their soul, they think of their body.
Those who know that the soul is formless and
immaterial, are indeed partly free from error,
but many of them are not quite freed from the
fundamental mistake. People of this class have
no clear notion of formlessness and immateriality.
Though speaking of the soul as formless and im-
material, they in a manner attribute form and
materiality to it. They think of the soul as a
subtle thing confined to a particular part of
space. As, according to this view, the soul is
a small thing confined to a small portion of
space, whatever is external to that portion of
space, whatever lies outside of it, appears to
be external to the soul. To say that such things
are indissolubly connected with the soul — are
dependent on the soul— seems to be so much
metaphysical raving. By thus mistaking matter
to be the soul, and attributing the material
qualities of extension and size to the soul, people
become blind to the deeper truths of the spiritual
world, mistake their own ignorance and thought-
less notions for ' common sense,' and failing to
realise the truths revealed to the keen insight of
the wise, set them down as so much senseless
MIND AND MATTER
talk. People of this class do not see that if the
soul is to be believed as something confined to
a portion of space, it must be regarded also as
having a particular size, and that if it has a
particular size, its formlessness and immateriality
are gone, and it has become something material.
The fact is that the soul is essentially conscious,
it is consciousness itself, shining by its own light
and revealing thereby matter, which depends
for existence on its support. This consciousness
is the fundamental characteristic of the self. It
involves no idea of length, breadth or size. Con-
sciousness is neither long nor short, neither broad
nor narrow, neither deep nor shallow ; it has
no such quality. It is therefore a great error to
regard the conscious self as something having
size or as confined to such a thing. The self has
no space relations with matter ; its relation to
it is one of knowledge. The self is the knower,
the subject, and matter is the known, the object.
To say therefore that the self is in a certain
portion of space, is true only in the sense that
the former knows the latter. In this sense the
self may be said to be in everything it knows.
It cannot be confined to any one of the things
it knows. If it were confined to any one of
them, it could not know the others. I see my
I THE SOUL NOT IN' SPACE 25
hand, this pen and this piece of paper. These
things are external to one another. Now, people
think that just as these three things are external
to and independent of one another, so is the
self a fourth thing occupying, like the other three,
a distinct portion of space and looking at them
from there. It is because of this false notion of
the self that people believe matter to be some-
thing independent of consciousness. The fact is
that consciousness, the self, is equally present to
all these three things, and is not confined to any
one of them ; nor does it occupy any portion of
space beyond them. The self is consciousness,
and whatever is an object of consciousness is
within its sphere. It is the common support of
all objects of knowledge. However, we shall
discuss more closely later on the relation of space
to consciousness.
Another cause which makes people think of
material objects as independent of consciousness
is that by consciousness people usually under-
stand their own individual consciousness, the
limited consciousness of finite beings. We know
that our knowledge is confined to very small
limits. We know that at a time, by one glance
or a momentary act of touch, we can apprehend
very little of the material world — how little, we
26 MIND AND MATTER CHAP.
shall show hereafter. And the little we thus
know does not always remain in our conscious-
ness. But we believe— and this belief is not
groundless— that the material world continues
to exist even when it leaves the sphere of our
individual consciousness. When, by conscious-
ness, people understand only the individual cons-
ciousness, it is nothing surprising that they should
think of the world as existing independently of
consciousness when it is out of the sphere of our
individual knowledge. But by saying that the
world cannot exist independently of conscious-
ness, we do not mean that it cannot exist in-
dependently of any individual consciousness. We
do not say that when we do not know the
material world it ceases to exist. What we
really say is that even when we do not know it,
it exists in consciousness. How the individual
consciousness is related to that in which it then
exists, the reader will see by and by. The reader
will indeed admit that the nature of the world
revealed to individual consciousness is its true
nature. There is really no other means of learn-
ing the true nature of the world than what we call
the individual consciousness. But what do we
learn by our individual consciousness about the
nature of matter ? Is it not this, that it is some-
1 COXSCIOUSNESS— INDIVIDUAL AND UNIVERSAL 27
thing essentially related to consciousness ? Really
it is impossible to learn anything else. Things
known can be known only as related to, as
dependent on, consciousness. When, by our
individual intelligence, we learn that the world
is, by its very nature, something dependent on
consciousness, we must believe that even when
we do not know it, it still exists in some cons-
ciousness ; otherwise it cannot exist at all. We
state this truth in the current language of
common sense, which may be interpreted as
meaning that when we do not know the world
it exists in some consciousness quite distinct or
separated from our consciousness ; but really it
is not so. We shall show gradually- — the reader is
not expected to understand it clearly at this stage
of our discussion— that it is not a fact that the
world is continually passing from one conscious-
ness to another like a ball tossed from one person's
hand to another's. What we call the individual
consciousness is not merely individual. Though
its manifestation in individual life is limited, it
is not essentially limited. The consciousness
which is manifested in our individual life, which
shines as the light and support of all that we
know, remains ever-waking and manifest to
itself in the midst of our individual ignorance.
28 MIND AND MATTER
oblivion and sleep, and supports the world.
However, we shall explain these truths at length
in the proper place.
We shall now discuss each quality of matter
and show that it is not anything independent
of consciousness — that it cannot exist except in
relation to it. This section of our book is most
useful in correcting the popular error in regard to
matter ; the reader will therefore do well to pay
particular attention to it.
Extension is the common characteristic of all
material objects : ever}' material object has exten-
sion or spatiality. Qualities like colour, smell,
warmth, and coldness may not be possessed by parti-
cular objects, but every material object has exten-
sion. That this extension or spatiality is dependent
on consciousness,that it is not anything independent
of mind, — we have already explained in a general
way. We shall now explain it particularly. Let
us take as example the piece of paper before us.
So long as we merely look at this piece of paper,
and do not touch it, we perceive only two of
its qualities — its extension and its white colour.
Instead of white, it may be coloured blue, yellow
or green. It may have, and may be conceived
as having, any colour. No particular colour is
absolutely necessary for it. But the reader will
I PKRCEPTIOM OF EXTEXSION IMPLIED IN' SENSATIONS 29
see that whatever colour it may have or may be
conceived to have, it is absolutely necessary that
there should be extension with it. It is only
with extension — as extended — that colour
appears or can be conceived : extension is
I absolutely necessary for colour. But on the
other hand, colour is not absolutely necessary
for extension. We have seen that in the absence
of white, extension may exist with blue, and in
the absence of blue with green and so forth, no
particular colour being necessary for the percep-
tion of extension. Nay, extension may be
perceived even without any colour at all. The
blind have no sense of colour, but they perceive
extension. Extension appears to them with
sensations of touch. Not only to the blind, but
to those also who have eyes, extension may and
does appear with tactual sensations. In the case
of these sensations also, it is found that the
perception of space is absolutely necessary for
them — for the sensations of warmth and cold,
smoothness and roughness, hardness and softness.
It is impossible for these sensations to be felt or
imagined without a perception of extension,
but the perception of space is not necessarily
accompanied with these sensations. In the absence
of heat, space may be perceived with cold ; in
30 MIND AXD MATTER
the absence of cold, with smoothness or rough-
ness and so forth — none of these sensations being
absolutely necessary for the perception of space.
Nay, in the absence of all tactual sensations,
extension may be perceived with colour. There-
fore, as we saw before that space is not dependent
on colour, but is independent of it, so we see now
that it is not dependent on touch, but is in-
dependent of it.
We therefore see that of the qualities with
which space is perceived, it is dependent on
none, — none being absolutely necessary for it,
but that it is indispensably necessary for
perceiving them. Nay more. Visual sensations
like white, blue and green, and tactual sensa-
tions like heat and cold, may be conceived
as absent, as non-existent ; but the non-
existence of space cannot be conceived. We
may imagine that the colour, smoothness, soft-
ness &c., of this piece of paper are destroyed ;
but we cannot imagine that the portion of space
it occupies is destroyed. The existence of the
former qualities is not necessary for thought, but
the existence of space is necessary for thought.
But it must be seen that though no particular
visual or tactual sensation is necessary for space,
it can be perceived or imagined only as a con-
SPACE A FORM OF PERCEPTION"
dition of perceiving such qualities. Otherwise —
as anything unrelated to them — it can neither
be perceived nor imagined. It is necessary only
as conditioning the perception of the qualities
named. Now, two conclusions follow from the
,above discussion : — ^(i) Space is not anything
independent of consciousness. A reality inde-
pendent of mind, an alien to mind, cannot
be so indissolubly related to it that it cannot
perceive certain things without perceiving it, and
cannot even conceive its non-existence. Some-
thing independent of consciousness cannot be
indispensable for it ; it must be such that consci-
ousness may or may not apprehend it. But space
is indispensable to perception — to the perception
of visual and tactual sensations. What is so
closely, so indissolubly, related to knowledge
cannot be independent of it. Besides, of that
which is independent of consciousness, which is
an alien to consciousness, even though it be
known, nothing absolutely true can be said, for
what it is today it may not be to-morrow ; what
it is this moment may be changed in the next.
And as to making any statement in anticipation
of actual knowledge — that is quite impossible
in regard to it. But in regard to space we
possess both necessary truths and anticipa-
32 MIND AXD MATTER CHAP.
tions. In the first place, it is absolutely certain
that in whatever other way matter may be
changed, it must be extended — extension is
necessary for matter. Other qualities may come
and go, but extension must remain permanent.
This is true even of things which have not come
within the sphere of our individual consciousness.
It is sure also of all visual and tactual sensations
which we may have in future that they will all
be conditioned by space. In the second place,
we know that the three dimensions, — length,
breadth and depth, — which space as perceived
by us possesses, must be possessed also by the
space beyond our sphere of individual knowledge.
We can make this assertion even without perceiv-
ing that space. Now, the fact is that it is only
because space is dependent on knowledge, some-
thing which is its own, that it can make these
assertions and anticipations regarding its nature.
They would be impossible if it were something
independent of it.* (2) Though space is depend-
ent on Imowledge, it is not an object by itself, but
* The necessary truths of Mathematics all imply the
dependence of space on mind. They would not be neces-
sary if space were anything independent of mind. As the
subject is not likely to be intelligible to the general
reader, we avoid a lengthy discussion on it.
I INFINITE DIVISIBILITY OF SPACE 33
only a necessary form of perception, for, as we
have already seen, it can be perceived or imagined
only as the necessary condition of sensations and
never as anything independent of them. Colour,
touch &c., are, as it were, the matter of perception,
• but as these sensations cannot be perceived with-
out space, as the mind cannot perceive them except
as in space, except in the form of extension, we
have called it a necessary form of perception.*
We do not know how far the reader unfamiliar
with Philosophy has followed the above exposi-
tion. We hope that what has seemed abstruse
and unsatisfactory at the first reading, will seem
clear and convincing if he reads it with close
attention a nurnber of times. However, we are
going to explain in another way the dependence
of space on mind, and hope that this exposition
will appear to some readers more intelligible and
convincing than what has just been given.
Let us divide the piece of paper before us into a
number of parts with real or imaginary lines. The
portion of space occupied by it can be divided
* See Kant's Critique of Pure Reason : Transcendental
Aesthetic; and Prof. E. Caird's Critical Philosophy of
Kant, Book I., Chapter II. See also the relative sections
of Prof. T. H. Green's Introduction to Humes Works and
pp. 228 — 251 of the second volume of Green's Works.
34 MIND AND MATTER
into such parts. It really consists of such parts.
Space is essentially divisible into infinite parts —
it is a sum of such parts. However small space
may be, it must have parts. No space can be
so small as to be indivisible — to have no parts.
There can indeed be such a small portion of
space that it is not in the power of man or any
other creature to divide it any more. But we do
not speak at present of the power of the creature.
What a created being cannot divide still has
parts. The nature of space is such that however
small it may be, it must have parts, or in other
words, must be divisible. Space cannot be
indivisible or without parts. But cannot a
portion of space be divided into parts so small
that they are mere points and have no magni-
tude ? The reply is that such points, even if
imaginable, would not really be parts of
space. Real parts of space, parts which taken
together make space, must have magnitude. Not
even millions of points having no parts and
magnitude could make real space having magni-
tude. Space, however small it may be, must
have some magnitude, and must therefore have
infinite parts — must be infinitely divisible. Now,
let us think of the relation with mind of the
portion of space we have taken for our example
1 , UNITING FUiXCTION OF M!.\U 35
and of its parts, which are all external to and yet
connected with one another. The reader has
understood in a general way that whatever
appears to the mind as its object is essentially
related to it — has the mind as its support. He
» has also seen in a general way that extended
objects, though they are external to one another,
are all within the sphere of knowledge and
depend on knowledge. We wish now to show
particularly that the connection subsisting be-
tween the parts of this portion of space — the
connection which makes its existence possible,
has consciousness for its necessary condition. It
is by the unifying power of the understanding
that they are united. The connection of distinct
objects imply something which, though one and
indivisible, is in all of them, binding them together
and bringing unity into their discreteness. There
can be no union without something to unite.
What is that uniting principle in the present case ?
In the present, and in all such cases, that uniting"
principle is consciousness — the conscious self. If
consciousness were confined to some one of these
parts, they could not be united, and in the
absence of union the space in question would be
impossible. The conscious self, though one and
indivisible, is in each of them, and hence their
36 MIKD AND MATTER CHAP,
union. It is their common support and unifier.
We do not mean to say that these parts were
separate before and consciousness afterwards
brought them together. We do not speak of that
artificial union which is effected by bringing
together different things existing independently
of one another. We speak of that union or
synthesis which is the very nature of space, with-
out which space would be impossible. This piece
of paper may be torn into pieces unconnected
with one another ; but the space occupied by it
cannot be so divided. Its existence consists in
the synthesis of distinct parts. Each of these
parts again consists of smaller parts. Space means
just this synthesis of infinite parts, and it is of this
synthesis that we speak. This synthesis is not
an event in time. It is not something that once
was not, but took place at a particular time. It
is, as Prof. T. H. Green says, " a timeless act."
If any one objects to call it an act, we may call
it a condition. Whatever it may be called, it is
doubtless dependent on consciousness. If it be
called an act, consciousness is its necessary cause.
If it is a condition, consciousness is its necessary
support or presupposition. It may be objected
that a synthesis of distinct objects implies that
the objects themselves are essentially disparate
I SPACE AN INFIXITE SYNTHESIS 37
and can exist without being synthesised and
therefore independently of a synthesiser, and that
an object which has its origin in a synthesis
alone depends on it. When space is said to be a
synthesis of distinct parts, is it not admitted that
' the components of the synthesis are independent
of consciousness and the synthesis alone is depend-
ent on it ? This objection has in a manner been
already answered. It doubtless applies to a mecha-
nical synthesis. The agent of such a synthesis
has really no essential relation to the components
of the synthesis. In such a case the objects united
may exist independently of one another and there-
fore independently of a unifier. But this does not
apply to space. Space is something the very exist-
ence of which depends on synthesis. It is an
infinite synthesis. As the synthesis of the parts of
a particular portion of space depends on conscious-
ness, so each part depends on the synthesis of its
own component parts. It is in this infinite syn-
thesis of parts that space consists. It is not that
the components first existed unconnected, and
then came the synthesis. The components really
have no existence apart from the synthesis ; with-
out it they are unthinkable and meaningless.*
* See Green's Pvolegomena to Ethics, Book I, Chap. I,
Sees. 28, 29.
38 MIND AND MATTER
We have thus shown that space, the form in
which matter is perceived, depends on conscious-
ness. We shall now show that the matter of
perception — colour, hardness, smell &c., which
are supposed to be things or qualities of things
independent of mind, are not so, but are also
dependent on consciousness. We shall show
that they are mental states, sensations or ideas.
We shall show that they are what the English
psychologists call ' feelings ' or ' sensations,' and
the Buddhist philosophers vijndnas (ideas).
Sensations are things dependent on consciousness,
their existence being impossible without conscious-
ness. Before we enter fully into the discussion,
let us discuss a little the relation of a sensation
to the mind. Let the reader imagine that he
feels a pain. A pain is a sensation. Leaving
aside the question how, under what circumstances,
the sensation arises, let us confine ourselves to
thinking of its relation to the conscious self, which
is its essential condition or support. We see on
the one hand that there is a sort of difference, of
duality, between the pain and the self. The
pain is not the self nor is the self the pain. But
on the other hand, the pain is a sensation or idea
of the self and is nothing without relation to it.
When its relation to the self ceases, it ceases too.
1 RELATION OF FEELINGS TO CONSCIOUSNESS 39
A pain, a feeling, which a mind does not feel, is
an absurdity, a nonsense. Really the term
' feeling ' does not stand for a distinct, independ-
ent reality. We use it only for convenience'
sake. There is no such thing as ' a mere feeling,'
the concrete reality being ' I feel.' ' A feeling ' =
'I feel once.' 'Two feelings ' = ' I feel twice.'
' A series of feelings ' = ' I feel continually.' There
is therefore no reality corresponding to the term
' feeling ' or ' a series of feelings,' — a feeling or
series of feelings being nothing apart from the
conscious self.
We shall now show that just a^ a pain is a
sensation or idea which cannot exist independ-
ently of the self, so colour, touch, smell &c.,
which we call qualities of matter, are also
sensations and cannot exist independently of the
conscious self. Let us first take up colour.
Colour is something seen. It is as something
seen that it appears to the mind, and even when
we do not see it, we can think of it only as seen
by some person or other. We have already seen
how we involve ourselves in a self-contradiction
if we try to believe that what we know only as
seen and can think of only as such can exist
unseen. However, we shall now explain at some
length the truth that colour is nothing independ-
40 MIND AND MATTER CHAP.
ent of consciousness, that it is only a sensation.
One circumstance which leads people to think
that it is not merely a sensation, but is something
independent of mind, is that colour appears in
association with space, — that it seems to be one
with space, to be an extended thing. That an
extended object should be a mere sensation,
seems absurd. But we have shown that space is
not one with colour — that it is independent of
colour. It has also been shown that space,
though it is not a sensation, is yet not anything
independent of mind, — that it is a form of per-
ception— a form of perceiving visual and tactual
sensations. Therefore, the doubt about the
dependence of colour on mind which arises from
the fact of its association with space is ground-
less. Colour is what we see, what we feel with
our visual organ. But that what is seen exists
independently of sight is absurd. To the blind,
colour is nothing. There would be no such
thing as colour if there were no seer and no
power of seeing.
Another cause that prevents people from
seeing that colour is a sensation, is this : To
people not accustomed to philosophical reflec-
tion it seems as if the same visual form can be
and becomes visible to different persons. Sensa-
1 ILLUSIONS REGARDING VISION 4I
tion is an individual affair : every one directly
perceives only his own sensation ; the same
sensation cannot be perceived by more than one
person. Your pain can be felt only by you ;
I can only indirectly take notice of it ; it is
' impossible for me to feel it. What I feel is
only my own pain. When, therefore, the same
visual form can be perceived at the same time
by many persons, how can it be called a mere
sensation, a mere mental state ? This argument
works in people's mind. Really, however, it is
not a fact that the same visual form is seen by
many persons. Every seer really has a distinct
form presented to him, there being as many
forms or images as seers. The forms are indeed
similar to one another, but they are not numeri-
cally identical. Nay, we really have two distinct
but similar images presented to our two eyes —
images which coalesce in actual vision. We
shall show the truth of our statement by one
or two examples. Let the reader look at an
object, say a book before him, in the company
of a friend. It seems to you that both of you
see the same form, but you will soon find out
the mistake of thinking so. Let one of you shut
one of his eyes and look at the object with only
the other eye. Then let him, with a finger put
42 MIND AND MATTER CHAP.
on the lower lid of the eye, move the eye-ball.
He will see that the form seen by him will
move with the eye while the form seen by his
friend will remain unmoved. The reader will
now see whether the forms seen by him and his
friend are identical or not. He will further see
that when the eye is unmoved, the form seen is
also unmoved, and when the eye moves, the form
also moves. This will show him whether the
form seen is anything independent of sight or
only an image depending" upon it. The proof
that we see two coalescing images with the two
eyes, the reader may find ready at hand. In the
natural state the two eyes are in the same
straight line with each other. Let the reader
somewhat disturb this natural condition as
before by a finger put on one of the eye-lids.
Let him somewhat lift up or bring down one
of his eye-balls, and he will find that he sees
two images with the two eyes. The reader who
thinks that the forms seen by us are things in-
dependent of sight, may now be asked to say
which of these two distinct forms seen with the
two eyes is the real thing and which is a mere
shadow, and also whence the shadow comes.
If he says that the form seen with the unmoved
eye is the real thing, he will see, on moving
[ VISIBLE AND TANGIBLE OBJECTS DISTINCT 43
that eye, that the form seen by it has also begun
to move. If both the ej^es are moved simul-
taneously, both the forms will move. The fact
is that there can be no question in the case
which is the real thing and which the unreal.
What we see is real to the eye, and to the eye
alone. Whatever things are seen are of the
same nature, whether you call them realities or
forms, images or representations. What we see
is only an image dependent on sight and is
therefore liable to change with the change of
the visual organ and the conditions of vision.
What we see is real to sight, to the eye, but not
to the other senses. \Vhat is seen is only seen ;
it cannot be touched, tasted or felt in any
other way.
Another cause leading to errors about the
object of vision is the mistaken notion that the
objects of vision and touch are the same, — that
what we see we also touch, and what we touch
we also see. The same thing is supposed to be
the object of touch to different people and so the
same form of the thing is supposed to be the
object of vision to different people. Whether
the same thing can be the object of touch to
different people, we shall see by and by. But it
is certain that what is touched can only be
44 MIND AND MATTER
touched and cannot be seen. The objects of
touch are heat, cold, smoothness, roughness,
softness, hardness and so forth. The objects of
sight are white, yellow, blue, red and other
colours. Heat, hardness, roughness &c., cannot
be objects of sight ; neither can white, yellow,
blue &c., be objects of touch. The objects of
sight and touch are indeed connected by the laws
of causation. For instance the colour of an
orange seen before may indicate the proximity of
its cold touch and sweet taste ; but objects of
sight and touch, — visual and tactual sensations —
are quite dijfferent from one another.
There are many popular errors regarding
visual objects, errors which prevent people from
understanding the true nature of these objects.
We have, however, no space to point out these
errors at length. We shall speak only of two
such errors. Those who wish to investigate the
matter fully will better read some large work on
Psychology. The error we shall first point out
here is this : People think that the forms seen by
them can exist and do exist at a distance from
their eyes, — that distance is an object of direct
vision. But it is not really so. What each one
of us sees is only a picture on our retina. That
a form seen seems to be at a distance is the result
DISTANXE IKVISIBLE 45
of experience and association. To a person
without visual experience all forms seen appear to
be immediately close to his eyes. Scientific
experiment has proved that when a man born
blind regains his eye -sight through a surgical
operation, everything he sees seems to be touch-
ing his eyes. Perhaps the first visual impressions
of children are similar to this, as appears from
their stretching their hands to get hold of the
moon. It is easy to understand why it is
impossible for us to see distance. Distance is a
straight line extending forward in the same
straight line with the eye. That it is impossible
to see the length of such a straight line, the
reader can easily understand by holding a stick
before him in the same way. It is only one of
the ends of such a line — namely that one which is
in touch with the eye — that we can see. It is
therefore impossible for us to see distance in the
line of sight and consequently a distant form.
We often find that to touch the tangible object
causally connected with the image seen by us—
for instance the tangible pillar before me indicat-
ed by the pillar-image seen by me — we have to
go to some distance, more or less, and that the
colour and size of the image seen vary according
to the amount of this distance. From this
46 MIND AND MATTER CHAP.
variation and by other means we acquire a
knowledge of the distance of the tangible object.
By constant habit this mediate knowledge
acquired from experience comes to be thought of
as immediate and intuitive knowledge. How-
ever, what we know to be distant is not visible,
but only tangible. What we see is not distant,
but in touch with the eye — in fact in the retina.
Another popular error relating to vision is
that we see very large objects by mere sight.
The fact is that each time, by each glance, we
see only a very small object — something not larger
than the eye. This will be somewhat evident
from what we have said above. Since what we
see is nothing but an image in the retina, how
can it be larger than the eye ? We cannot see
anything larger than the organ of sight. How-
ever, we shall prove this truth in another way.
Let the reader roll the fingers of his hand into
something like a pipe, and holding it before one
of his eyes, look at some object. If he attends
■only to the object seen and not to the circum-
ference of the improvised pipe, the form seen will
appear much larger than the latter ; but if he at-
tends to both, he will find that the image seen is
confined within the circumference of the pipe, so
that the former is not larger than the latter.
I COLOUR CHANGES BY CHANGE OF VISION 47
From this we understand that what we see at one
sight is a very small object. That it appears
larger is the result of experience. By habit the
knowledge acquired from experience appears to
be intuitive. We have learnt by long experience
that the object causally related to the image seen
by us, — for instance the real or tangible house
indicated by the image-house seen by us — is a very
large object, so that by constant association the
idea of the image at once suggests the idea of the
large tangible object, and we mistake this sug-
gestion as immediate knowledge or common sense.
We hope that a consideration of such facts will
somewhat moderate the enthusiasm of some of
our readers about 'common sense,' which, in many
cases, is only another name for nonsense.
In the above discussion on colour, we did not
confine ourselves to mere colour, — the extension
implied in colour having inextricably been mixed
up with with our treatment of it. But this did
not effect the validity of our conclusions. We
shall, however, now say a few words on colour
only, so far as it is possible. If colour were any-
thing independent of sight, it would surely not be
changed with changes in the seer or the way or
instrument of sight. What is independent of
knowledge and of the knov/er cannot be changed
iMIND AND MATTER CHAP.
with him or the medium of his knowledge. If
the object known changes with every such
change, it at once shows itself to be dependent
on knowledge — to be nothing but a sensation of
the knower. We are going to show that colour,
smell, taste, sound and touch are all liable to
change with such changes. The colour that we
see in an object when we look at it with our
bare eyes, is changed when it is seen with a
telescope. The colour seen from a distance varies
on near vision. Brilliant light shows one colour
and faint light another. A keen and a dull sight
see different colours. What seems white to
healthy eyes appears yellowish to those affected
with jaundice. Now, which of these two sets of
colours is real ? Which one of them is independ-
ent of sight and which is unreal — only relative
to the eye ? And what sort of a thing is the
unreal colour ? W^hence does it come ? The
reader will see that the essential character of
both is the same — being seen or known. Both
of them being objects of knowlege, one of them
cannot be pronounced to be merely relative to
knowledge with any reason not applicable to the
other. The difference lies only in the medium of
sight ; but this difference cannot make one
dependent on sight and another independent of
SMELL A SENSATION 49
it. When change in the medium of sight changes
the object seen, it is proved that the latter is not
independent of sight, independent of knowledge,
but that it is only a sensation of the seer.*
We have given so much space to the discussion
of colour because it seems to be particularly
difificult for a reader unfamiliar with Metaphysics
to understand that it is only a sensation and
nothing independent of knowledge. As to the
other so called qualities of matter, — smell, taste,
sound and touch — it is not so very difficult to
understand that they are only sensations. Of
these, it is comparatively more difficult to under-
stand the dependence of touch on knowledge.
After discussing smell, taste and sound briefly,
we shall at the end treat of touch at some
length.
Smell. — Before we feel smell, particles of the
smelling object must enter our nostrils and
produce a certain action on the olfactory nerves,
and that action must be carried to the brain.
From this the reader will see that the object of
smelling cannot be the same to all, though it may
be similar, — that each one of us has a similar
* See Locke's Essay on the Human Understanding, Book
II, Chaps. IV — VIII, and Berkeley's Dialogues between
Hylas and Philonus.
50 MIND AND MATTER
though distinct smell. He will also see that it
is most absurd to suppose that what we smell
existed or can exist unsmelt. Apart from the
smeller and the power of smelling, smell is
nothing. That smell can exist unsmelt, is a
meaningless proposition. It can only be said that
even when smell is not felt, the cause of smell
remains, just as even in the absence of a pain its
cause may remain. By and by it will be seen
that even what is called the cause of smell is
something dependent on consciousness. Then,
as colour changes with change in the seer and
the medium of sight, so smell too is changed
with change in the smeller and the medium of
smelling. Every one knows that what smells
most foul and unpleasant to us is eaten with
relish by some animals. Not only between man
and the lower animals, but even between man and
man, there is much difference in this respect.
What the gentler classes shun as hateful smell, is
most acceptable to some people of the lower
classes. Many of our readers perhaps know the
story of the fish-woman who, having become a
guest one night in a flower- woman's house, could
not sleep on account of the perfume of the
flowers, and who had at last to try to get sleep
by soaking her dried up fish-basket in water
TASTE AND SOUND
51
and taking in its 'sweet smell.' If smell were
anything independent of consciousness, the same
object would not smell differently to different
beings. That it does so, proves that smell is
only a sensation differing according to different
conditions.
Taste. — Every word of what has been said of
smell applies to taste. The taste felt by one
person cannot be the object of another's taste.
The object of different persons' taste may be
similar, but not the same. Even similarity is
not found everywhere. What is agreeable to
my taste is disagreeable to another. What is
sweet in good health is bitter in ill-health.
Taste also then differs according to different
temperaments and other conditions. Who will
say then that it is anything independent of
feeling ?
Sound. — The sound heard by different hearers
may be similar, but cannot be numerically the
same. W^e do not hear until an aerial undu-
lation strikes against the trumpet of our ears and
the nervous shock produced by it is communicated
to the brain. The aerial undulation and the
nervous shock are not objects of hearing ; they
therefore are not sound ; sound is the sensation
produced by them. The sound heard by different
52 MIND AND MATTER
persons may be similar, but cannot be the same,
and like smell and taste it differs according to
different conditions. What is a loud sound to
me is a low one to a person half-deaf. One
standing near a cannon and hearing a loud sound
thinks that the low sound I hear from a distance
is only a faint form of the same sound that he
hears. Is it so ? How can loud and low be
descriptions of the same thing? Can a large
mango-tree and a small one be the same ? The
fact is that what he has heard has not been
heard by me, — that we have experienced two
different but somewhat similar sensations. The
identity lies only in their cause, which we shall
discuss later on.
Touch. — By touch we experience two kinds
of objects, — (i) what can be known by simple
touch, and (2) what we know by pressure com-
bined with touch. Heat, cold and the state
intermediate to these two belong to the first
class, and roughness, smoothness, hardness, soft-
ness and resistance to the second. That the
first-mentioned qualities are mere sensations and
different to different minds, the reader will have
no difficulty in understanding. The coldness I
experience in touching the table before me is my
sensation, and what the reader does in the same
TACTUAL SENSATIONS 53
manner is his. Our sensations may be similar,
but cannot be numerically the same. What has
been said about coldness applies also to heat
and warmth. The heat felt by me on account
of my nearness to a fire — is it in me or
out of me ? The reader will perhaps say that
heat, being an etherial vibration, cannot be
in me. But is the etherial vibration an object
of direct experience ? The fact is that the etherial
vibration which scientists call heat is only the
inferred cause of the heat or warmth felt by us,
and is not the object of our present discussion.
About this it would now suffice to say that this
vibration is conceived in the form of things seen
and touched. If we can show that what we see
and touch is dependent on consciousness, it must
then be admitted that this inferred vibration is
also similarly conditioned. Though not ex-
perienced by us on account of the limitations of
our mental powers, it must undoubtedly be the
object of some higher consciousness. Either it
is that, or it is merely an imaginary and not a
real object.* The subject of our present dis-
* The same remark appHes to light, the etherial
vibration which scientists conceive as the cause of colour.
Either it is something dependent on experience or it is
nothing.
54 MIND AND MATTER CHAP.
cussion is the warmth or heat we feel. Unless
the etherial vibration spoken of above is com-
municated to our nerves, we do not feel this
warmth or heat. The heat or warmth thus
produced is evidently a sensation and different to
different persons. The heat felt by two or more
persons may be similar, but cannot be the same.
And even the similarity is not constant. What
is cold to one person may be warm to another
differently conditioned. Nay, even if the same
person has one of his hands warm and the other
cold, the same object will seem cold when touched
with the warm hand, and warm when touched
with the cold hand. If the object of feeling were
the same and independent of feeling, this would
not be the case. The fact is that the mind,
under varying conditions, experiences various
sensations. What is experienced is dependent on
experience and not anything independent of it.
The reader will see that as in the case of
sight it is only an object in contact with our eyes
that we see, and what we see is not larger than
the organ of sight, so in the case of touch it is
only something in contact with our body that
we can touch, and that what we touch, that is
the extension that we perceive along with our
feeling of touch, is not larger than the part of
MUSCULAR SENSATIONS 55
the body used in touching. For instance, what
we touch with the hand is not larger than the
hand, and what we touch with the foot is not
larger than the foot. But if we continue to have
tactual feelings while moving the limb where-
with we touch, we learn that the object touched,
— that is the extension perceived along with
the tactual feelings, — is larger than the limb
used in touching. But we have already seen that
the extension or space thus perceived is also an
object dependent on experience.
We shall now discuss the tactual sensations
of the second class. These sensations are so
different from tactual sensations of the first class,
that they are called tactual only for convenience'
sake. They are closely connected with tactual
sensations, and cannot be experienced without the
latter, but they are not themselves tactual sensa-
tions. The sensation that we experience in
moving our hands over a rough place or when
the motion of our hands is stopped on their
coming into contact with a wall or a table, or
when we press a table with one of our limbs, in
a word, when the motion of a limb is opposed —
is, in the language of Psychology, called resist-
ance or muscular sensation. In current phraseo-
logy it is called, in some cases, roughness, in
56 MIND AND MATTER CHAP.
some hardness. Whether, when this sensation
occurs, it is reasonable to infer a cause of it in-
dependent of experience, we shall discuss later
on. Let the reader first try to understand that
the direct object of our experience in such a case
is only a sensation. If he takes into considera-
tion the fact that this object appears to every one
separately through the instrumentality of his own
muscles, and differs according to differences of
body and mind, he will see at once that it is not
anything independent of experience, but only a
sensation dependent on consciousness. That
something is hard, means that its contact gives
rise to a great deal of muscular sensation. The
"something" spoken of is itself, it will be seen on
examination, nothing independent of conscious-
ness, but is really dependent on it — constituted
by extension, tactual sensations and such other
properties as can exist only in relation to experi-
ence. However, this muscular sensation too,
like other sensations, differs according to different
conditions. What is hard to an infant is soft to
a grown-up boy and softer to a youngman.
What is hard to the weak is soft to the strong
and vice versa. The seat, bed or clothing which
the rich and the luxurious reject as rough, is
smooth and acceptable to the poor. These
1 END OF THE DISCUSSION 57
objects of sense are evidently relative to con-
sciousness and different to differently constituted
persons. What is common and invariable in
them is due to the general similarity in the
physical and mental constitution of men. As
this similarity is not perfect, so their sensations
also are not perfectly similar. However, if hard-
ness, softness and the like are various according
to individual variations, where is their independ-
ence ? Like other qualities of matter (as they are
called) they too are mere sensations dependent
on consciousness and are nothing apart from it.
Here ends our discussion of the so-called
qualities of matter. The reader sees that what
people regard as properties independent of mind
are really sensations dependent on consciousness.
In perceiving what we call the material world,
therefore, we do not really go out of the mind,
out of the spiritual world, but know only spirit
and objects related to it. But this conclusion
will not be quite clear till we have discussed
certain questions which we have reserved for
another section.
REFUTATION OF NATURALISM CHAP.
Section 3 — Refutation of Naturalism
Those of my readers who are unacquainted
with philosophical literature will perhaps be
quite satisfied with the above exposition and will
see the error of the popular belief that matter is
independent of mind. But perhaps those who
have studied Philosophy more or less are not yet
quite free from doubts. They have heard from a
class of philosophers, — and have perhaps believed
what they have heard — that besides what is
popularly called matter, there is a matter which
is not perceived, but which nevertheless exists.
As that matter is not an object of perception, the
arguments adduced in favour of the relativity
(dependence on mind) of the matter that we
perceive, are not sufficient to disprove the inde-
pendence of the former. For the sake of those of
our readers who accept this philosophical
doctrine, we proceed to a brief exposition and
refutation of it. The philosophers referred to
teach that though what we call the qualities of
matter are really mere sensations, there is an
unconscious object beyond the sphere of direct
perception which is their substance and cause.
This doctrine is called Naturalism. Those who
hold it think that unless matter is believed to be
independent of mind, its reality is not acknow-
I MATTER AS SUBSTANCE AND CAUSE 59
ledged. As they acknowledge the independence
of matter, and in this sense its reality, they call
themselves Realists. As holding the duality
or mutual independence of matter and mind,
they are also called Dualists. This philoso-
phical Naturalism is — as the reader must see —
very different from popular Naturalism, which
takes sensible qualities as independent of mind.
However, we shall show the error of this philoso-
phical doctrine and make way for Idealism, the
doctrine we are seeking to establish.
As to the matter conceived by Naturalists
being the substance of what we call material
qualities, it is perhaps enough to say that since
these qualities are acknowledged as sensations, it
is extremely absurd to imagine an unconscious
object as their substance or support. Mind alone
can be the support of sensations or feelings.
Matter, which is conceived as without conscious-
ness, can never be the substance or support of
objects depending on consciousness. In fact the
idea of a material or unconscious substance is
suggested only when colour, sound &c., are
thought of as the qualities of an external object.
But we have already seen that these are not such
qualities, but only sensations in the mind.
Let us now see if this ' matter ' can be
6o REFUTATION OF NATURALISM CHAP.
accepted as a cause of sensations. We shall give
a little more detailed exposition of Naturalism
before we proceed to its examination. Let us
take the table before us as our example. The
table is endowed with the qualities of extension,
colour, smoothness, hardness &c. We have seen
that the latter are all sensations, that extension
or space is a form of perception, and that all
these depend upon consciousness. Modem Natu-
ralists admit all this, but they say that each of
these objects of perception has an unperceived
cause behind it, that these causes are the real
qualities or constituents of matter and the sum of
these qualities or constituents is the real material
substance. That is to say, though the extension
we perceive by our senses of vision and touch is
a mere appearance and depends on consciousness,
there is an unperceived extension which is its
cause. Similarly, there is an unperceived or
unseen colour which is the cause of the colour
we see, an unfelt hardness which causes the hard-
ness we feel, and a super-sensuous material sub-
stance which is the sum of these properties. We
already begin to see what an absurd doctrine
Naturalism is. Can the reader form any idea of
such things as an unperceived extension, an
unseen colour, and an unfelt hardness ? And it
I UNKNOWABLENESS OF MATTER 6l
may be asked, If these material qualities are
beyond sense, where lies their difference ? Why
do they bear different names ? Colour is seen,
but not smelt. Hardness is felt, not seen. So
colour and hardness are distinct things or facts.
But where is the distinction between the colour
which is not seen and the hardness which is not
felt ? And why should such colour and such
hardness be called by different names ? The
difference lies only in their effects and it has
reference to the different senses of the mind in
relation to which they are produced. The cause
may be the same, as different actions may be
done by the same personal agent. It is enough
for Naturalism, therefore, to postulate only a
single material cause of sensations, and this cause
may be said to be endowed with various qualities
only in the sense that it is capable of producing
various sensations. That this cause is called
matter, should not lead the reader to think that
it possesses the variety of colour, smell, touch
&c., which is presented by the matter which
forms the object of our perception. We have
shown just now that what is unperceived —
unseen, unfelt — cannot possess this variety, for
this variety can be conceived only with reference
to our senses. It is called matter only in the
•62 REFUTATION OF NATURALISM CHAP.
sense that it is conceived as unconscious. The
only thing, therefore, which the Naturalist knows,
or rather thinks that he knows, about this
material cause, is that it is on the one hand
unconscious and on the other endowed with
power, — power to produce sensations. With the
exception of these two characteristics nothing is
known, nothing can be known, of it. In other
respects it is unknowable. It is from this unknow-
ableness of the material cause that many Natura-
lists call themselves Agnostics. We need hardly
say that the above characterisation of matter is
not imaginary, but is approved by prominent
Naturalists.*
Now, on this Naturalism we have to make
the following remarks : —
I. We can infer only that, or something
similar to that, which we have known by direct
knowledge. What we have seen, heard, felt or
known by self-consciousness, or something similar
to that, can, when absent from direct knowledge,
* See Spencer's Principles of Psychology, Part VII
(Vol. II) and Green's criticism of this part in the fust
volume of his works. See also the essay on " Science,
Nescience and Faith " in Martineau's Essays — Philosophical
and Theological Vol. 1, and the essay on " Agnostic Incon-
sistency " in my Roots of Faith.
LIMITS OF IMAGINATION 63
be known on the testimony of others or by infer-
ence. When we have known our own self by
self-consciousness, we can conceive other selves
or know them by inference, though they are not
objects of direct knowledge. When once we
have perceived colour, taste, smell, sound, touch,
&c., they may, even in case they are not directly
perceived, be conceived as objects of our future
perception or that of other persons. When
scientists, having perceived the vibration of things
seen or felt, imagine the vibration of a thing
(ether) so subtle that it is neither visible nor
tangible, even then they do not go beyond reason,
for this inferred vibration is conceived in the
likeness of visible or tangible vibration. Though
not perceptible to our gross senses, it is per-
ceptible to a person endowed with subtler powers
of perception. But what has never been perceived
and never can be, what, by its very nature,
is entirely different from objects of direct know-
ledge, what is neither a knower nor anything
known, neither a subject nor an object, such a
thing can never be the object of indirect know-
ledge or inference, and the existence of such a
thing, therefore, cannot be believed. The matter
imagined by Naturalists belongs to this category,
and its existence therefore is quite incredible.
D4 REFUTATION" OF NATURALISM CHAP,
It is a wonder that while not believing in gods,
sprites, giants and devils — things whose existence
is conceivable though not provable, and while
doubting the existence even of the Supreme Spirit,
men yet believe in this metaphysical devil. Is not
such a belief in 'the wise,' more absurd than the
most baseless superstitions of the ignorant ?
2. If Naturalists represented their un-
knowable matter as quite unknowable, it would
be difficult, perhaps impossible, to make
people believe in it. But instead of this they
pronounce it, in the same breath, to be both
knowable and unknowable. As they say, it is
unknowable and at the same time the cause of
sensations. What causes sensations has evidently
at least one quality, and cannot therefore be un-
knowable. However, that a cause of sensations
is necessary, admits of no doubt. Every effect
must have a cause, and as the rise of sensations
is an effect, it must undoubtedly have a cause.
And the cause must be permanent. Reason is
not satisfied without a permanent cause of
impermanent effects. When, therefore, the Natura-
list refers sensations to a permanent supersensuous
cause, he readily secures people's assent. But why
go far in search of a cause when one is near at
hand ? Is not the mind itself the cause of sensations ?
I SELF THE CAUSE OF SENSATIONS 65
The fact to be explained is that the mind or self
experiences various sensations. Why imagine
a not-self, unknowable and inconceivable, to
explain this simple fact? The conditions
necessary for the rise of sensations are (i) a sensi-
tive or feeling self, (2) something which remains
permanent in the midst of sensuous changes, the
succession of one sensation to another, and (3)
something to produce the sensation. Now are
not all these conditions to be found in the self?
It is the self that feels sensations, it is the self
that remains unchanged as an witness when sensa-
tions change and follow one another, and it is
the self that produces sensations, — becomes sen-
sient by its own activity. It is the idea that in
sensation the self is purely passive* which makes
people imagine a not-self as causing sensations in
it. But such an idea — ^that of the self's passivity
— is purely arbitrary, and the result of a false
analogy — that of a piece of wax acted on by a
stamp and producing impressions on it. Such an
analogy may represent — but even that only imper-
fectly,— the action of a material body on the body
or sense-organs, but is quite out of place in
representing the rise of sensations in the self.
* An idea common to the Indian Sankhya and the
Western Dualist.
66 REFUTATION OF NATURALISM CHAP.
Sensation being purely mental — a form of con-
sciousness,— it bears no impress, and furnishes no
proof, of anything extramental — any not-self.
It implies only the self's spontaneity or activity —
its capability of assuming various sensuous forms.
But our opponent may object, 'We do not pro-
duce sensations by our will, how then can the
self be said to be the cause of sensations ?' Does
he admit, then, that causality or agency — the
power of producing changes — implies will ? If
he admits this, his Naturalism, his Agnosticism,
is gone. If the cause of sensations is a Being
endowed with will, he is neither unknowable nor
unconscious matter, he is a knowable and know-
ing Person. If it be admitted that causality or
agency does not imply will, why not ascribe the
causality of sensations to the self instead of an
unknowable and inconceivable not-self. We shall
see later on that causality does indeed imply
will ; but we do not mean to assert that our
individual volitions are the causes of sensations.
Evidently it is not our individual will that causes
the sensations we feel. But this does not prove
that that the self we call our own is not the cause of
sensations. Our individual volitions do not exhaust
our selfhood. There are many things in the self
which do not depend upon our volitions. The
I MATTER EXPLAINS NOTHING 67
consciousness that forms its very essence is not
dependent on, but is rather the cause of, our voli-
tions. This consciousness, irrespectively of our
personal volitions, manifests itself in the forms of
sensations, memory, understanding and emotions,
and thus makes our individual lives. Leaving
the discussion of the subject in greater detail for
a future chapter, we would this moment only
ask the reader to realise that for the origination
of sensations and other mental facts it is not
necessary to imagine an extramental cause, a not-
self. The characteristics required by the Natu-
ralist for such a cause are all to be found in the
conscious self which forms the basis of our lives.
He wants that the cause of sensations should be
permanent and that it should be independent of
our personal volitions. As the consciousness
forming the basis of our lives possesses both these
characteristics, it is needless to refer sensations
to an unknowable and unconscious something
instead of referring them to the conscious self.
3. Not only is it needless to imagine such
an unconscious power, but it is extremely un-
reasonable. This imaginary power gives no
explanation of the origination of sensations.
That only is a real cause which reasonably
explains the effect. What cannot explain an
68 REFUTATION' OF NATURALISM CHAP..
ejffect cannot be called its cause. We shall try
to show that the material cause supposed by
Naturalists gives no explanation of sensations.
Naturalism, though it admits that sensations are
mental, imagines them as, in a manner, distinct
from the self, and therefore tries to explain their
origin by something other than the self. But
we have already seen that sensations are nothing
apart from the self. Sensation or feeling = I feel.
It is nothing apart from the self. There is no
such thing as a 'mere feeling or sensation', and
therefore there cannot be any cause of 'mere
feeling', — anything that explains 'mere feeling.'
That alone can explain feeling which can explain
the self, and as, according to Naturalists them-
selves, the material power conceived by them is
incompetent to explain the self (which requires
no explanation), it is incompetent to explain
feeling, and can therefore never be the cause of
feeling.
4. That alone can explain feeling which is
closely connected with mind. That alone can
produce feeling in the mind which is either in
the mind or in which the mind is — under whose
control the mind is. But according to Natu-
ralists themselves, the matter conceived by them
is external to the mind. To be something in
3 DIFFERENT MEANINGS OF 'CAUSe' 69
the mind, it would have to be either a knowing
subject or some object dependent on the subject ;
consequently Naturalists take care to keep it
outside the mind. But nothing can be more
unreasonable than the idea that what, by its
very nature, exists out of the mind should
produce feelings in it from outside, — should make
it feel various sensations. What is external
should be incompetent to act internally, and
what acts so cannot be anything external. That
an absolutely external thing should act inter-
nally, is a palpable self-contradiction. That
such absurd and self-contradictory propositions
are presented as philosophical truths and received
as words of profound wisdom, is apt to take
away one's patience and lead one to call the
teachers of such doctrines wise in their own
conceits, 'blind leaders of the blind.'
5. It is because the Naturalist totally forgets
the meaning of 'cause" that he ascribes causality
to an unknown something. It is a relation
between known things that we call causality.
We observe the relation in the knowable world.
But the Naturalist, having learnt causality in
the world of knowable things, gradually forgets
its meaning and gives the name to a fancied
relation between known things on the one hand
70 REFUTATION OF NATURALISM CHAP.
and something unknowable on the other. Let us
explain this fully. The scientific meaning of
' cause ' is what the effect invariably follows, or
more briefly, (though somewhat incorrectly), an
invariable antecedent. Contact with fire is
invariably followed by burning ; it is therefore
the scientific cause of burning. The contact of
the organ of vision with light is invariably
followed by the sensation of colour ; light there-
fore is the cause of the sensation of colour. The
contact of the organ of touch with the etherial
vibration called heat is invariably followed by
the sensation of warmth ; heat therefore is the
cause of the sensation of warmth. The contact
of the organ of smell with particles of flow^er-
pollen and other things is invariably followed by
the sensation of smell ; such particles therefore
are the cause of smell. The combination of
oxygen and hydrogen is invariably followed by
the production of water ; such combination
therefore is the cause of water. This is one
meaning of 'cause'. According to this scientific
theory of causation, the cause of an effect is itself
an effect. An effect or number of effects is the
cause of another effect, and all such effects are
sensations. We do not know and cannot con-
ceive of any effect or event which is not a sensa-
SCIENTIFIC CAUSE 7 1
tion. A sensation or series of sensations forming;
the cause of an effect may not be the object of
our individual knowledge, but to believe in the
actual existence of such a sensation or series of
sensations, it must be believed that it is the
object of a superhuman consciousness. The
flower-pollen or such other things which form
the cause of smell are, though not objects of our
individual consciousness, nothing but visible or
tangible objects ; to believe in their existence
therefore is to believe in a superhuman spirit as
their support. Similarly, the particles of food
which cause taste, and the vibration of air which
causes sound, are visible or tangible objects,
though not objects of our individual conscious-
ness, and are therefore dependent on some super-
human consciousness. It will be seen therefore
that this scientific theory of causation does not
carry us beyond the knowable world. The causes
of sensation assigned by it are themselves sensa-
tions, and are therefore objects of knowledge.
Scientific causality is a relation that can exist
only between sensible objects — between objects
of knowledge. It is nothing but a relation of
fixed antecedence and sequence. An event that
follows another event or series of events is the
effect of the latter, and an event or series of
72 REFUTATION" OF NATURALISM CHAP.
events which is followed by another event is the
cause of the latter. If ' cause ' means this, not
unknown, unknowable and inconceivable thing
can be the cause of sensation.
We find another kind of causality in the
knowable world, one which is called metaphysi-
cal causality. This causality also cannot carry
us out of the sphere of knowledge, for it too can
exist only between known realities. We fmd
that the self, as a subject conscious of itself,
is experiencing various sensations, connecting
them by its uniting power and organising them
into various ideas, and is willing various ends.
In this case the self and its actions are related as
cause and effect. The self is the cause of these
effects, cause in the sense that its existence is
the necessary condition of the production of
these effects. But here also the relation of causa-
lity exists between known things, the causes
and effects being both known or knowable.
Here too causality does not carry us beyond the
knowable world and gives us no inkling of any
unknowable reality. On the contrary, the cause
here is consciousness itself, — the conscious self —
the condition of all knowledge, something
without knowing which nothing else can be known
and all actions of which are based on knowledge.
METAPHYSICAL CAUSE 73
Whatever the self does, — whether it feels
sensations like colour and taste, or draws an
inference, or puts forth a volition — it does every-
thing consciously, and because it is conscious.
If it were not conscious, it could not do all this ;
its activity depends upon its consciousness. If
we try to understand 'activity', we find that it
necessarily depends on consciousness, that it is
unmeaning and impossible without the latter.
What is unconscious, therefore, can never be
active. We see clearly, then, the error of
Naturalism and Agnosticism. The unconscious
and unknowable something that Naturalism con-
ceives as the cause of sensations can by no
means have causality. It cannot be a cause in
the sense of an invariable antecedent, for such
a cause is within the realm of knowledge, and
itself requires another cause. And it cannot be
a cause in the sense in which the self is the
cause of mental phenomena, for such causality
depends on consciousness. Therefore, the un-
knowable cause conceived by Naturalism is not
a cause in any sense. It is a cause without
causality, an unknowable known thing, a self-
contradictory expression, a mere jumble of
words — it is nothing.
The reader must have grasped the conclusion
74 REFUTATinx OF NATURALISM CHAP.
we have so far arrived at by our discussion on the
self and the not-self. To what does knowledge —
which is our guide to belief — bear witness? Not
to any unconscious and unknown reality, but to
knowledge itself, to consciousness, — to a conscious
self. This consciousness has two sides or
aspects. In one aspect it is a knower and known
as such, and in another it is only known. The
first is called subject, and the second object.
These two aspects can be distinguished, but not
divided or separated. People try to separate the
object from the subject — to conceive the one as
apart from the other ; but we have seen that
the subject is the necessary support of the object
— that nothing remains of the object if we attempt
to conceive it out of relation to the subject.
\Ve have tried to show that what we call
matter is conditioned by mind— that the one
cannot exist except in relation to, except as
supported by, the other. Of these two aspects
of consciousness one may be called the self, and
the other the not-self ; but it must always be
remembered that the self and the not-self are
both inseparable aspects of one indivisible reality,
— consciousness. The one concrete reality is
consciousness, which we have often called merely
the self. The term 'self seems to be sufficiently
CONXLUSION 75
expressive, for it implies both subjectivity and
objectivity. The self both knows and is
known. It is to this self, this conscious reality,
that knowledge bears witness. Whatever we
perceive by direct knowledge is included in this
reality. What we do not perceive by direct
knowledge, but know by inference, must also be
believed as included in knowledge, as object of
•the conscious self. If the reader believes that
there is an endless world in endless space, that
the world exists independently of our individual
acts of knowing, he must then believe that there
is a supernatural Mind supporting the world.
That the same Consciousness, the same supreme
Self, supports all time and space, all objects
of this diversified world, and at the same
time manifests itself as our life,— that even
during the sleep, oblivion and ignorance of our
individual lives the world exists in one eternal
infinite and ever-waking Self — all this we shall
prove by and by. Up to this point we have
come only to the conclusion that knowledge or
conciousness is the support and cause of the world,
— that nothing can exist apart from consciousness.
76 KNOWLEDGE AND THE SENSES CHAP.
Section 4 — Knowledge and the Senses
There is perhaps in the mind of some of my
readers a lingering doubt as to the conclusion we
have just arrived at, and I shall try in this sec-
tion to remove it. They may say, — We take it
as proved that all objects known through the
senses, — colour, smell, warmth, hardness and the
rest — depend on consciousness, are nothing
but sensations. But are not the senses themselves,
through which w^e perceive these objects, independ-
ent of consciousness ? Do not sensations imply
the senses ? If so, we must conclude that the
senses existed before sensation as one of its
factors, and as such are not dependent on consci-
ousness. Now, in meeting this point, we must
first ask, ' \\' hat are the senses ? ' When this
question is properly answered, all difficulties
vanish. The term ' senses ' bears two meanings.
In whichever of these meanings it may be un-
derstood, the senses are found to be objects depend-
ent on consciousness. It must always be remem-
bered that it is not the senses that perceive, the
real percipient being the self. To the unreflective
it is the eyes that see, the ears that hear, the
tongue that tastes, and the hands that touch.
Every thoughtful person knows that these notions
are erroneous. A lifeless bod}' neither sees nor
I THE SENSES A? POWERS AND ORGANS 77
hears, neither tastes nor touches, though it has
eyes and ears, a tongue and hands. It is the self
that sees and hears, tastes and touches. But it is
through the senses that the self does all this.
Now let us see what this through points to.
Seeing, hearing, tasting and touching are all
actions of the self. Now, the fact that the self
can see, — its power to see, — may be called its
sense of sight. But this power or sense is nothing
independent of the self, it is identical with it.
Similarly, the self's power or sense of hearing and
its power or sense of touching are identical with it.
The knower and the power of knowing are not
different things, but the same. If this is the meaning
of ' the senses,' the proposition that the self per-
ceives through the senses, that is, through its own
power of perceiving, does not imply the existence
of any extramental object ; it is only a somewhat
roundabout way of expressing the simple truth that
the self perceives. Now, this power of knowing,
which is identical with the self, evidently does
not depend on any other reality. On the contrary
it is that on which all other things depend. As
we have already seen, the consciousness of self
is the support and condition of the consciousness
of other things, and the existence of all other
things is conditioned by the existence of the self.
78 KNOWLEDGE AND THE SENSES CHAP.
By 'the senses', we mean, in the second place,
the bodily organs like the eyes and the ears.
Whether we consider the external or the internal
formation of these organs, they are in every
respect things physical — parts of the objective
world, and as such included in the sphere of
knowledge. The self illumines or reveals them,
as it does other physical objects ; and as other
objects exist in relation to the knowing self,
so do they. The eyes, the ears, the nose,
the tongue, the skin, the nerves, the muscles, are
things either seen or visible, touched or tangible.
Whatever we have said, therefore, of things
visible and tangible, applies to them. They
cannot exist except in relation to consciousness.
If so, if these objects are really dependent on
the conscious self, how then can we say that the
self knows through these objects, experiences
sensations through them ? How can knowledge,
apart from which the senses cannot exist, be
itself dependent on the senses ? We do not in-
deed mean to say that the eyes, the ears, and
the other organs are dependent on our individual
perceptions, our acts of knowing,— that they
originated in the course of the growth or manifest-
ation of our individual knowledge. That they are
not so dependent, that they existed before the
I MIND ITSELF BEYOND SENSE 79
manifestation of our individual perceptions, is in-
deed beyond doubt. But our individual perceptions,
as we shall see by and by, are the revelation
of an objective and universal Consciousness on
which everything depends and which cannot
depend on the senses. Because the senses are in-
dependent of our individual perceptions, it does
not follow, therefore, that they are independent
of all knowledge, and the condition of all know-
ledge. In fact not only the senses, but all that
we perceive through them, are independent of our
individual perceptions. They all existed before
the individual manisfestation of consciousness
which we call our life. But as other objects,
though independent of our individual perceptions,
are yet dependent on a superhuman Conscious-
ness revealed by our perceptions, so are our
senses dependent thereon. When the senses
possess all the characteristics of material objects,
they must be held as dependent on consciousness
on the same ground on which other objects are
held to be so dependent. They too exist in relation
to the same superhuman Mind to which other
objects owe their existence. The senses can have
no speciality to that Mind. It is absurd to think
that that Mind knows through the senses. As
mind is the necessary condition of the existence of
8o KNOWLEDGE AND THE SENSES CHAP.
the senses, how can mind itself be dependent on
the senses ? If it be said that there is no proof of
the existence of a superhuman Mind, we can at
present say only this in reply that if so, neither
is there any proof of the existence of the sense-
organs before they became objects of our in-
dividual knowledge, or after they cease to be
its objects. The appearance of the sense-organs
and other material objects to our individual
consciousness is the only basis of our inferences
about them. It is from this basis that we infer
that these objects existed even before this appear-
ance took place. Now if this our individual
perception is a valid ground for the the inference
referred to, it is a valid ground for another in-
ference, however little it may occur to the
ordinary or even the scientific understanding,
namely that the consciousness in relation to which
these objects appear is not itself anything new,
anything that occurs now, but that its individual
form only is new, whereas it existed even before
it assumed this form. However, we shall discuss
this point at length in its proper place. We have
shown only this much at present that the same
evidence that proves that our sense-organs ex-
isted before they appeared to our individual
consciousness, also proves that they existed in
I INDIVIDUAL KNOWLEDGE DEPENDENT ON SENSE 81
relation to a consciousness — the same conscious-
ness in essence, as we shall see, in relation to
which they now appear. As these organs are
dependent on that consciousness, it cannot depend
on them. That it knows through these organs,
that is, through objects dependent on it, is an
absurdity.
But though consciousness itself cannot be de-
pendent on the sense-organs, it is evident that
its manifestation m our individual lives is, in
a sense, dependent thereon. It is superfluous to
point out that without the action of our eyes,
ears, nerves, &c. we do not have the sensations
of colour, sound, touch and the rest. That the
action of the sense-organs is the scientific cause,
the invariable antecedent, of sensation, is beyond
doubt. But the scientific cause of an event is
not its sole cause, not a cause that satisfies
reason. Scientific causes are themselves effects
and call for other causes. The ultimate cause
of all effects — their metaphysical cause — is the
self. That the sense-organs which are the
scientific cause of our individual perceptions are
not independent, that they too, like other
objects, are dependent on the self, is, we hope,
now evident to the reader.
82 THE SELF — UNIVERSAL AND INDIVIDUAL CHAP.
Section 5 — The self — universal & individual
From what the reader has read of this book
it may seem to him that we deny the unity and
permanence of the world and reduce it to
different selves and their transient sensations.
It is not surprising that this should seem to be
the purport of what we have so far said, but in
reality it is not so. When the reader will have
gone through our second and third chapters,
he will see that as to ordinary belief, so to
philosophical knowledge, the world is one and
permanent. In this matter the difference between
current belief and philosophical knowledge is
that while to the former the world is independ-
ent, to the latter it is dependent on the
conscious self. However, we shall give
here some idea of this truth — of the unity
and permanence of the world — without keeping
the reader waiting for the lengthy exposition of
our second and third chapters. We have proved
in this chapter that there is no independent not-
self, what appears to be so being really dependent
on the self. In every act of perception we know
an undivided reality of which the one side is the
knowing subject and the other the known object.
If the reader has comprehended the truth that the
known object cannot exist independently of the
I PERCEPTION- REVEALS A UNIVERSAL SELF 83
knowing subject, and that the latter is unmean-
ing without reference to the former, then the
object of our first chapter has been gained.
The question now is. Is the self we know in
every act of perception individual or universal ? In
showing that colour, taste, smell, sound and
touch are dependent on consciousness we have
repeatedly said that they are different sensations
of different selves. But here and there we have
also said that what we call our own self is not
merely individual, but is essentially universal,
all-comprehending, eternal and infinite, its in-
dividual manifestation alone being finite and
transient. This truth is implied in the explana-
tion we have given of the material world. The
current belief is that the material world exists
independently of the self, and that in our acts
of perception it comes into relation with the
latter, the relation ceasing with the cessation
of perception. If the reader has followed our
explanation, he must have seen that this is not
a correct description of perception. The true
interpretation of perception is that in it an
indivisible consciousness, a subject-object, is
manifested in a finite form. In that reality sub-
jectivity and objectivity are indissolubly related.
It is not true that a subject and an object.
84 THE SELF — UNIVERSAL AND INDIVIDUAL CHAP.
essentiall}' unrelated to each other, comes into
relation for a time : it is an indivisible reality
containing the two moments of subject and
object in unity and difference with each other
that is manifested in every act of perception.
Thus it will be seen that our self has not really
that independence of or separation from the
world of objects which is implied in calling it
individual. Since in knowing every object
we know the self as indissolubly related to it,
where is its separation from the world of objects?
It is because the true character of perception is
not comprehended that the self and the world seem
to be independent of each other. When this — the
true character of perception — is comprehended, it
is seen that in knowing an object we necessarily
know the self on which it is dependent — that
it is impossible to know an object without know-
ing the self on which its existence depends. And
the self we know is no other than the self we
call our own. It is the self I call my own which
is manifested as the support of everything I
perceive. It is the self I call my own that, in
my perception of my body, is manifested as that
which sees, touches and understands it — as the
subject and support of the object, the body. In
perceiving the table before me, — in seeing,
I TWO ASPECTS OF THE SELF 85
touching and understanding it, I know my own
self as its support. Whatever object I perceive,
I know my own self along with it as its support.
It is true that in every act of perception the self
manifests itself as finite, that is, as the knovver
and support of a definite number of objects,
but that it is essentially infinite, and not finite,
is evident at every step. That what was un-
known to me a moment before is now known
to me, that every day what was unknown before
becomes known, shows that what I call my indivi-
dual and finite self is not essentially individual
and finite, but is in essence universal and infinite.
If the reader considers all this, he will see that
the self we call our own has two aspects,
individual and universal, finite and infinite.
That the self is essentially one, that the Supreme
Self is the self of all cresitui'es—Sarvabhutdntardtmd,
as the U panishads call him— the reader will see
by and by. We shall expound this truth at
length in our third chapter. For the present,
let the reader try to apprehend the truth that
in every act of perception we know the same
self — the self we call our own — as an individual
self — 'vijndndtma in the language of the Vedanta —
and as the universal Self — the self of the world
(visvdtmd). When the objects perceived by me
86 THE SELF — UNIVERSAL AND INDIVIDUAL CHAP.
cease to be the objects of my individual percep-
tion, they seem to be severed from my self. It
seems that in that condition they, though they
may form the objects of some other self, are
surely not the objects of my self. But the reader
vi^ill see that we necessarily conceive of their
existence in that condition as dependent on
knowledge — the knowledge of our own self.
Unless we conceive of them as such, no
conception of them, no belief about them, is
possible. As the table before me, when per-
ceived through the senses, is presented as the
object of my self, so must it be thought of
in its absence from my senses as the object
of my own self. Unless it is conceived as such,
no conception of it, no belief about it, is possible.
And it is evident that such a conception and
belief is necessary. If, in our acts of percep-
tion, we perceived any object independent of
knowledge, we might, even on the cessation of
perception, think of and believe that object
as independent of knowledge. But in per-
ception we do not come across any such object.
What is manifested in perception is what we call
our own self, with the colours, tastes, touches &c.,
which are indissolubly connected with it. If,
therefore, we must conceive of and believe in
I THE TWO ASPECTS INSEPARABLE 87
the existence of the object of perception even on
the cessation and in the absence of the percep-
tive act, we can think of and believe in it only
in the form in which we perceive it, namely as
our own self and its objects. Thus a close inquiry
into the nature of knowledge and belief discloses
the fact that in conceiving and believing the
universe to be permanent, connected and one, we
really conceive our own self as permanent, as
the connecting principle, and as one. The truth
that the world is permanent, connected and one,
means this, and nothing else, that the selves which
at first right appear to be many and independent
of one another and of the world, are essentially
one, indivisible and the support of the world.
As we have already said, the self we call our
own, has two aspects, finite and infinite, indivi-
dual and universal. In our perception of nature,
we specially realise its universal aspect. We
then see that it is the self, the support, of the
universe. When, on the other hand, we abstract
as much as we can from our knowledge of nature
and attend specially to self-consciousness, we
realise specially that it is a finite or individual
self. But these two aspects are inseparable,
though distinguishable, from each other. The
reader will realise this truth more and more
o8 THE SELF — UNIVERSAL AND INDIVIDUAL CHAP.
clearly as he proceeds. He will see by and by
that though the finite selves appear to be in-
dependent of one another and of nature,
there is nevertheless an essential unity behind
this discreteness. We have already stated the
fundamental principle of this exposition. Though
different minds feel different sensations, these
different sensations are knowable to all, — there
is a connecting link in them. The reader will
see that the Universal Self is the connecting link
and that it is because the Universal Self is the
inner self of each one of us, that it is possible for
us to know the different feelings of different
minds. We have said, moreover, that all space
is connected, and the self is the connecting
principle. Each one of us directly perceives by
his senses only a small portion of space, namely
the sentient parts of our bodies. We also know
objects external to the body when they touch it,
but such knowledge is not direct, but mediated
by inference. However, our knowledge of space,
be it mediate or immediate, involves in it the
ideas of unity and infinity. We know each por-
tion of space as included in one infinite space.
And in this knowledge of one infinite space is
implied the knowledge of the unity and infinity
of the self. We could not know one infinite
ANTICIPATION OF THE THIRD CHAPTER
space if we were not essentially one with the
one, indivisible, infinite Supreme Self. We shall
try to make this truth as clear as we can in our
chapter on " Unity-m difference."
CHAPTER II
THE TEMPORAL AND THE ETERNAL
Section i — Sensationalism and Subjective
Idealism
In this second chapter it is our purpose to
establish the eternality of knowledge. We pro-
pose to show in it that the consciousness which
manifests itself as the light and support of all that
we know, which is the only consciousness of
which we are directly aware, which is not subject
to our individual will, but is the cause and con-
dition of that will, which, though not manifest
in our hours of individual ignorance, oblivion
and sleep, re-manifests itself independently of our
individual will and dispels our ignorance, oblivion
and sleep— is not merely our individual conscious-
ness, but is ultimately an all-knowing and ever-
waking Self in which the world eternally exists.
At the very beginning of the present chapter,
we shall give an exposition of two philosophical
II EXPOSITION OF SENSATIONALISM QI
theories which are opposed to the truth stated
above, and then refute them by explaining at
some length the eternality of knowledge. They
are called Sensationalism and Subjective Idealism.
The former contends that as our sensuous know-
ledge,— the only kind of knowledge it recognises —
consists only of sensations, there is no such thing
as a permanent world. We are not directly
aware of any other consciousness than our own
and all that we perceive depend on that con-
sciousness. But as our individual/ consciousness
is subject to ignorance, oblivion and sleep, and
as the objects known by us are continually pass-
ing out of our consciousness, these objects
cannot be called permanent. These objects are
only transient states of our mind and the world
is nothing but a series of flowing, impermanent
sensations. What is now is no more next moment,
and what comes next moment is fresh sensation.
If it be said that there is a permanent self which
supports sensations, the reply is that this self is
nothing but the memory — an aggregate of recollec-
tions, of faint images— of past sensations. We
know this self only as the percipient and re-
collector of sensations, and as nothing else.
When therefore it falls asleep or otherwise
becomes unconscious, when it is no more either
92 SENSATIONALISM AND SUBJECTIVE IDEALISM CHAP.
a percipient or recollector of sensations, it cannot,
in any intelligible sense, be said to exist. As
its very existence means the perception of sen-
sations, how can it exist in an insentient state ?
That the self and the world seem to be permanent,
is the result of the association of ideas and ex-
pectation consequent upon it. Let us take for
example the table before us and explain the Sen-
sationalist theory of the world. It is only when
I see the table, touch it, and press it with my
hand or any other limb, that it exists actually ;
for it is nothing but an aggregate of sensations.
When I cease to feel these sensations, there is
no proof that they actually exist. And if they
do exist, they can do so only in relation to
another mind, — to me they are actually nothing.
But to me they exist as possibilities, though not
as actualities. When I simply see the table, and
do not touch it or feel my hands over it or press
it, its colour only is actually present to me ; but
the other qualities, though not actually present,
are present as possibilities. The recollections
of the sensations of colour, coldness, smoothness,
hardness, &c., which I experienced by seeing and
touching it, and by pressing it and feeling my
hands over it, exist in my mind in an associated
form, so that when one of such sensations is ex-
II EXPOSITION OF SEN'SATIONALISM 93
perienced, an expectation of experiencing the
others rises in the mind. When I only see the
table and perceive only its colour, — its coldness,
smoothness and hardness exist as possibilities,
though not actualities, that is, there exists the
possibility of their being experienced on the
necessary conditions being fulfilled. We have
learnt by experience that on putting our hand
in a certain place, we shall feel its coldness, and
that by feeling it over and pressing it with our
hands we shall experience its smoothness and
hardness. It is this expectation of experiencing
the sensations, this their possible existence, that
we describe in practical life as their actual or
real existence. What we mean by saying that
the table is cold, smooth and hard, that the
table has coldness, smoothness and hardness, even
without actually experiencing these sensations,
is simply the fact that the needful conditions
being fulfilled, there is a possibility of our ex-
periencing these sensations. In the same manner
when, by simply touching the table and even
without seeing it, we say, ' it is brown,' 'it has
a brown colour,' we mean only that when it
comes in sight, there is a possibility of our ex-
periencing the sensation of brown colour. Even
when the table is quite unperceived, when we
94 SENSATIONALISM AND SUBJECTIVE IDEALISM CHAP.
neither see it nor touch it nor have any other
sensations of it, we say 'it is' and 'it is brown,
told, smooth and hard,' and this only means
that the proper conditions being fulfilled,
there is a possibility of these sensations being-
experienced. i\nd this possibility is permanent.
Long experience has generated in us a firm faith
in the permanence and uniformity of the laws
of nature. We believe that on the occurrence of
the scientific causes of sensations, sensations must
arise. Even when that aggregate of sensations we
call a table is unperceived, we know that on the
necessary conditions being fulfilled, the sensations
which constitute it will be experienced. These
sensations exist, not as barely but as permanently
possible ; so that when unfelt by us, they may be
called permanently possible sensations or "per-
manent possibilities of sensation."* In the same
manner all natural objects, when unperceived,
are nothing but permanently possible sensations.
The existence of the world means its existence
as an aggregate of possible sensations. As the
world cannot exist except in mind, and as there
is no proof of a superhuman mind, and as the
* J. S. Mill. See his Examination of Hamilton, Chap.
XI : Psychological Theory of the Belief in an External
World.
II SENSATIONALIST THEORY OF THE SELF 95
mind of man and other animals is subject to
to ignorance, oblivion and sleep, the actual
existence of the world is not permanent ; it can
be called permanent only as an aggregate of
permanently possible sensations.
This in brief is the Sensationalist theory of
the material world. It is also the theory approved
by Subjective Idealism. To both the objective
world is nothing but a series of transient sensa-
tions. But the two schools differ a good deal in
their theories of the self. To Sensationalism the
self is as much a series of sensations as the world.
Sometimes it is found that the self can exist even
without experiencing sensations like colour and
touch. But even at such times there are in it
faint copies or representations of such sensations.
At such times it is nothing but an aggregate of
recollections. The remembered sensations are
only comparatively faint copies of actual sensa-
tions, and the self, when in the state of recollec-
tion, is only an aggregate of these faint copies.
In a state of utter oblivion and dreamless sleep,
there is no proof of the existence of the self, and
in fact there is no meaning in such existence.
It can very well be siid that in waking the self
is re-formed by the re-appearance of past recollec-
tions. However, we have not found any Sensa-
g6 SEN'SATIONALISM AND SUBJECTIVE IDEALISM CHAP.
tionalist setting forth this theory without hesita-
tion and inconsistency. David Hume himself,
the father of Western Sensationalism, has partly
admitted its inconsistency.* He acknowledges
his failure to explain how a series of transient
sensations persists as memory, — how such a lapsed
series returns, as it seems to do. John Stuart Mill,
partially a follower of Hume, having tried hard
to establish this theory, at length admits that
there is an insurmountable difficulty in establish-
ing, it. In the third edition of his bookf al-
ready referred to, he abandoned Sensational-
ism and accepted Subjective Idealism. The
insurmountable difficulty referred to by Mill is
this : — Sensations are transient and passing. A
sensation that passes away, passes for ever and
cannot return. What succeeds is fresh sensation,
whether vivid or faint. Now, memory tells us
that the same T who experienced a past sensation
experience also the present, — that though the
past sensation is gone, I am not gone with it.
Now, if the self were nothing but a series of
* See Hume's Treatise on Human Nature, Part IV. Sec.
VI. and its Appendix. See also Green's Introduction to
Humes Works.
I Examination of Hamilton, Chap. XII and the follow-
ing Appendix.
II WHERE THE THEORIES DIFFER 97
sensations, this verdict of memory would have
no meaning. A flow of transient sensations can
by no means know themselves as a permanent 'I.'
The self therefore is a permanent reality. It is
strange that Mill acknowledges this truth so late,
and that he ignored it when he was trying to
build everything in earth and heaven with 'expec-
tation' and 'association of ideas', which can have
no meaning unless the permanence of the self is
acknowledged.* It is indeed impossible to make
any assertion except on the supposition of its
permanence. "j" However, the difference between
Sensationalism and Subjective Idealism is here, —
the latter's admission of the permanence of the
self. But though acknowleding the permanence
of the self, this theory does not acknowledge the
permanence of knowledge. It does not admit
that the self is always knowing or conscious,
always sopddhika or saguna, in the language of
of Indian philosophy. Certain species of Subjective
Idealism, such as that of Sankara, teaches that the
self is ever-conscious of itself, whether in the
waking or dreaming state or in dreamless sleep.
* See a short but nice criticism of Mill's "'Psychological
Theory " in Masson's Recent British Philosophy.
t " A consistent Sensationalism must be speechless," —
Green.
go SENSATIONALISM AND SUBJECTIVE IDEALISM CHAP.
But they do not admit that the consciousness of
objects is inseparable from the consciousness of
the self, and that the self is always as conscious
of objects as it is of itself. Let us give a some-
what full statement of the theory.
The main contention of Subjective Idealism
is this : — So long as the senses work the self
undergoes modifications, but that this modified
or sopddhika state is not the essential nature of
the self, is easily seen. The objects of sense are
transient. The visible world exists only so long
as we keep our eyes open ; it disappears as soon
as they are closed. In the same manner tangible
objects exist only so long as we touch. Objects
of sense are transient — passing in the ever-flowing
current of time. The sensible world is nowhere
when the senses cease to work. It is only the
eternal, unmodified, nirupddhika self that exists
then. It may be objected that even when the
senses cease to work, the world exists as the
object of the self's memory — as the object of
pure non-sensuous knowledge. But where is the
proof for this statement ? Memory too, like per-
ception, is only a transient state of the self.
We do not remember always all that we perceive.
Like sensuous knowledge the knowledge furnished
by memory too passes away. And then, as
II ARGUMENT FOR SUBJECTIVE IDEALISM 99
to the state of sleep, though some conscious-
ness of objects persists in dreams, it entirely
ceases in dreamless sleep. In that state the
self is conscious only of itself and not of
any object. If you contend that self-con-
sciousness cannot exist without object-conscious-
ness, let us admit that a bit of object-conscious-
ness persists till then. But this does not prove
the permanence of this diversified world of ob-
jects. If it be said that though the individual
self forgets the world, the Universal Self does not,
and that his knowledge is always differenced, the
reply is that there is no proof of the existence of
such a Supreme Self, with a differentiated content
of knowledge. Self-knowledge is the only basis
of the knowledge of Brahman, and our self-
knowledge bears witness only of an eternal un-
differentiated Self without objects. It is this
undifferented Self that is the seed of the world.
It is this self that becomes differentiated through
its Maya and appears as the world, but this
differentiation is not its permanent or essential
nature. In essence it is pure consciousness
without differences, without the giinas and without
objects. It is not a knower, not a subject or
agent of knowledge, but knowledge itself.
This argument in favour of Subjective Idealism
lOO KNOWLEDGE A UNITY-IN-DIFFERENCE CHAP.
seems apparently unanswerable, but on a some-
what close examination it is found to be extremely
fallacious inspite of its apparent validity. Self-
knowledge is indeed the basis of the knowledge
of God, but the Mayavadin, the Subjective Idealist,
does not really understand the import of self-
knowledge, which bears witness, not of an un-
differentiated self without objects, but of an Objec-
tive Self, a World-soul, with an infinitely differen-
tiated content of knowledge. We proceed to
explain our view as clearly as we can.
Section 2 — Knowledge a Unity-in-difference
We draw the reader's attention again to the
second of the two principles expounded in the
first section of our first chapter. We have shewn
therein that as the self cannot know anything
without knowing itself, so it cannot know itself
without knowing some object or other. As self-
knowledge is the support of the knowledge of
objects, so the knowledge of objects is the
constant accompaniment of self-knowledge. The
self can know itself only as a knower, and to
know itself as a knower, it must know something
which it can distinguish from itself. We have
seen that what the self knows, what forms its
object, is really within knowledge and
FALLACY OF SUBJECTIVE IDEALISM lOI
cannot exist independently of the self, — that
between it and the self there is only a
distinction, but no division. Nevertheless this
distinction is necessary for knowledge, knowledge
being impossible without it. The self cannot
know itself unless it knows something which it
can distinguish from itself. Knowledge is the
synthesis of two distinct but inseparable ele-
ments,— the knowledge of self and the knowledge
of objects. In the absence of any of these two
elements knowledge is impossible. In fact they
are two aspects of the same reality. It is the
same indivisible reality that wonderfully com-
prises this unity and difference.
It must now be seen that as we can neither
know nor conceive a self-knowledge without a
knowledge of objects, as, besides, it is something
absurd and self-contradictory, the existence of
such a thing is incredible. And it cannot be that
what is unknowable and inconceivable is really
believed by any one. It must therefore be of the
nature of those absurdities, accepted by popular
belief and philosophical theories, some of which
we have already dealt with. We thus see clearly
the fallacy of Subjective Idealism. The 'object-
less knowledge', the 'subject without a knowledge
of objects' which it speaks of, belongs to the same
KNOWLEDGE A UN'ITY-IN-DIFFEREN-CE
class of things as the Naturalist's 'unknown object
of knowledge', 'unfelt feeling', 'unknowable
cause', that is, 'unknowable object of knowledge'.
A mere object or a mere subject, a mere knower
or a mere knowable is not a reality. The only
reality is a conscious self which is a subject-object,
a unity-in-difference.*
In whatever way we may look upon the sub-
ject, it is found to be distinct yet related to the
object. The subject is one, the object manifold ;
but the 'one' unrelated to the 'many', is meaning-
less : 'one' means 'one in many'. The self is
permanent, unchangeable ; but the permanent,
the unchangeable, unrelated to the transient, the
changeable, is meaningless ; 'permanent' means
'permanent among the transient', and 'unchange-
able' means 'unchangeable in the midst of a flow
of change.' The self is out of space ; it is the
support of things in space, but is not itself ex-
tended. But unless it knows itself as distinct
from and yet related to things extended, it can-
not know itself as out of space. 'Out of space'
is meaningless except with reference to things in
space. A subject without objects, self-conscious-
* See Ferrier's Institutes of Mctaphysic, Section III :
Ontology, and Caircl's Hegel, Chaps. VII and VIII.
II ABSURDITY OF 'AN UNCONSCIOUS SELF' IO3
ness without a consciousness of objects, is there-
fore meaningless and impossible.
So far we see the error of the Subjective Ideal-
ism or Mdydvdda which believes in an objectless-
consciousness. We now proceed to show the
error — which can be easily done — of that form of
the theory which teaches the doctrine of a purely
unconscious self — a self which can and does be-
come wholly unconscious at times, losing both
its consciousness of itself and that of objects.
The first thing to be said against this theory is,
that as the self manifests itself as knowledge and
knowledge alone, as it is a conscious reality that
we know as self and call and understand by the
name, an unconscious self, that is an unconscious
consciousness, is nothing but a self-contradiction,
a meaningless phrase. It is nothing more real or
possible than the self-contradictory and absurd
things we have already dealt with. Something
that manifests itself as consciousness, is known
as consciousness, is called a self only because it
is conscious, whose selfhood consists in cons-
ciousness, whose very existence depends on cons-
ciousness— what remains of it when bereft of
consciousness ? What proof is there that it then
continues to exist ? How can a thing exist
without its attributes ? How can a conscious
I04 KNOWLEDGE A UNITY-IN-DIFFERENCE CHAP.
thing exist without consciousness ? For it to be
without consciousness is to cease to exist.
Secondly, if it be admitted for a moment that
even when bereft of consciousness, something of
the self yet remains, that an attributeless subs-
tance still persists, the Mayavadin, the subjective
Idealist, would gain nothing by this admission.
He may be asked. Why call this substance a self
and not matter ? How does a self without cons-
ciousness differ from matter ? The M^y^v^din
thinks that this attributeless substance can and
does become conscious again, and hence he calls
it a self rather than matter. But that is im-
possible. What has once become unconscious,
has lost all its knowledge, can never again re-
cover its lost knowledge. The M^y^v^din will
perhaps say, you characterise as impossible what
is happening in our daily experience. We see
every day how in sleep we lose all our know-
ledge— our knowledge of self and knowledge of
objects — and in rewaking recover it. What can
be a clearer proof than this of the fact that
the self, having once lost its consciousness,
can regain it, — that having once become
nirguna or attributeless it can again become
saguna, possessed of attributes ? This is the
Mayavadin's argument. We proceed to show
II KNOWLEDGE NEVER LOST IO5
its error. We shall show how little the Maya-
vadin understands the meaning of experi-
ence, to which he appeals. Let us suppose that
I lose my knowledge of the inkstand, the pen, the
paper and the table before me, and with that
the knowledge of my own self that constantly
accompanies it, and fall asleep. These ideas are
all gone, for, when the self becomes unconscious
where else can ideas exist ? My self, the essence
of my life, is left as an empty receptacle. In due
course I awake and regain my knowledge of the
inkstand, the pen, the paper and the table, and
that of my own self. I remember that I knew
these things before I fell asleep and that the same
self that knew them before knows them now.
The question now is. How could the knowledge
that was utterly lost, that had, as it were dried
up and left its receptacle empty, come back
again ? To the M^y^v^din, knowledge is not
permanent, it is only a transient flow of sensa-
tions or ideas. Now, past knowledge, that is, the
past flow of sensations, died away in sleep and
cannot come back. What comes now must be
fresh sensation or sensations. That a number
of fresh sensations are being experienced now, is
indeed a fact, but it is also a fact that with these
fresh sensations have come certain old ideas.
I06 KNOWLEDGE A UKITY-IN-DIFFERE\XE CHAP.
The knowledge that the new sensations are
similar to the old, which makes it possible for
me to recognise the things as known before
and the old knower as identical with the present
knower, implies really the presence of old ideas.
How could these old ideas come ? To the self
which lost both its self-consciousness and object-
consciousness everything must appear new. To
one who lost the old, the old can never
come. That the old ideas have come back, con-
clusively proves that they were not lost, that
neither self-consciousness nor object-conscious-
ness was really lost, that the self did not become
an empty receptacle. It is proved that self-cons-
ciousness, with which object consciousness is in-
separably blended, though it does not manifest
itself in the form of the individual consciousness
in dreamless sleep, yet remains intact in that
state, otherwise it could not manifest itself again,
as it does, in the state of waking. The reader will,
it is hoped, now see the error of M^yavdda. He
will see that though both the Sensationalist and
the Subjective Idealist make much of the "associa-
tion of ideas", they really do not understand its
full significance. They think that such associa-
tion is possible to a sleeping and forgetful self,
and that such abstract and impossible 'association'
II WHAT THE 'association OF IDEAS* IMPLIES I07
is the basis of memory and experience. But this
is a palpable mistake. What can the 'association
of ideas' mean to one, — how is it possible to one — ■
who forgets ideas at every step, who loses them
and even the consciousness of his own self ? How
can ideas remain associated or united in him
who at every step becomes devoid of ideas ?
Unless the objects of knowledge are indissolubly
united in an ever-waking and unforgetful Self
and unless this Self manifests itself in our indivi-
dual life, nothing like experience and memory is
at all possible.*
We have already said that the consciousness
that forms the essence of our life is not dependent
on our individual will. We have also said that
what we call our individual consciousness is not
absolutely individual. Perhaps the reader has
now got a glimpse of this truth. A glimpse,
however, is not enough. What we have said
briefly in this section, we shall explain more fully
in the next. We shall try to show clearly that
knowledge is eternal, that it has neither begin-
ning nor end, and that not a particle of it can
ever be lost.
* See Caird's Philosophy of Kant (old edition) p. 285,
p. 452 and sundry other places. Also Sankara's commen-
tary on the Brahma Sutras, II. 2. 31.
I08 KNOWLEDGE AND WILL CHAP.
Section 3 — Knowledge and Will
To understand the truth that an Eternal Con-
sciousness— ever- waking and unforgetting — is at
the basis of our life, it must at first be clearly
seen that our knowing — the appearance and dis-
appearance of sensation, memory, and under-
standing in our life, our waking and sleep-
ing— is not due to our individual volitions. Our
individual volitions are dependent on sensation,
memory and understanding, in a word, on know-
ledge. First knowledge, then volition. It
is impossible for the will, i.e. the mind conceived
as capable of acting, to put forth a volition
unless it knows, unless it understands. It is there-
fore evident that the manifestation of knowledge
in our life, — the appearance of sensation, memory
and understanding— is not dependent on our indi-
vidual volitions. The wonder is that we are so
blind to this truth, though it is so obvious. We
speak so egotistically of "my knowledge", "my
understanding", and "my life", as if these matters
depended on our individual volitions, as if our
own will were the creator of our knowledge, un-
derstanding and life. It is this blind egotism that
keeps off from us the true knowledge of God and
a clear realisation of his presence. However, let
us discuss a little the truth just mentioned.
II KNOWLEDGE NOT SUBJECT TO WILL IO9
That we see, hear and feel — that these innu-
merable sensations of colour, taste, smell, sound
and touch, and emotions of pleasure, pain, love,
reverence &c. are entering our mind and making
our life possibe — are these dependent on our
will ? Do we create them by our respective voli-
tions ? It is evident that such is not the case. Our
individual will is utterly inactive as to the rise
of these phenomena. These mental events must
occur first before our will can act. That these
diversified phenomena are appearing before our
mind day after day, moment after moment, that
wonderful scenes are being enacted day by day
and moment by moment on the stage of our
mental life without our will taking the least
part in them — people see nothing deep and mys-
terious in this. They do not pause to ask who
occupies the mind and plays these wonderful
sports with it. And yet no other scene presents
such a deep significance. However, it is evident
that our v/ill has no hand in these performances.
When these phenomena have appeared, our will
may take hold of them and put forth volitions.
But that too requires memory. When once these
phenomena have disappeared, the will cannot
act until they re-appear. But their re-appear-
ance is entirely irrespective of our volitions. We
KNOWLEDGE AND WILL CHAP.
cannot bring them back by our will. To forget
a thing is for it to be "out of mind", and on
what is out of mind, out of knowledge, the will
cannot act. It is only on something before it
that the mind can act. It will therefore be seen
on a little thinking that the recurrence of ideas
to our mind — our remembrance — does not
depend on our will. If it is due to any body's
will, it is the will of One in whose hand our mind
is, who nev4r forgets anything and who is play-
ing with the mind the solemn sport of forgetting
and remembering. Like perception, memory too
seems to ordinary people to be a plain and
simple thing, without anything mysterious about
it. But really it is a most wonderful and mys-
terious affair. We are every moment forgetting
the most useful things of life — things which, if
they did not return to memory, would make life
impossible. But in what a wonderful way they
are returning every moment ! When we are
deeply intent on some work, we forget our very
name, our residence, our age, the place and the
time in which we are, our house, the furniture,
our family, friends, the whole of our acquired
experience, — all things, even the event that occur-
red last moment. What would occur if these
things did not recur in time ! A total suspension
II MEMORY AND WAKING NOT SUBJECT TO WILL III
of memory would mean our reduction to almost
an inert mass of matter, for even the least action
requires memory. This act of writing on my
part would be impossible if the memory of these
writing materials, which was absent a moment
before, did not occur in time, if the knowledge
acquired before did not flow into the mind
moment by moment. That memory which is so
important to life, without which life would be
impossible, is not in the hands of our will. In
whose hands it is, we shall see by and by.
And then, waking from sleep is even a more
mysterious affair than perception and memory,
and yet to most people habit divests it of its
mysteriousness. In profound dreamless sleep,
perception, memory, and even self-consciousness
disappear. There is nothing that strikes at
a man's pride so much as sleep, if only he
understands its significance. It shows clearly
how very dependent man is. The wise and the
ignorant, the rich and the poor, the strong and
the weak, — all are equally helpless and depend-
ent in this condition. However, to awake from
it, to return from unconsciousness to conscious-
ness, is entirely beyond the power of our will, —
sleep comes and goes independently of our will.
We may help — only help and do nothing more —
112 TIME AND EVENTS CHAP.
the approach of sleep by voluntarily making our
limbs still and composing our thoughts, but
awaking is entirely independent of our will. In
sleep we lose the knowledge both of our body
and mind — our very self-consciousness ; any
exercise of our voluntary powers in it is therefore
out of the question. But how wonderfully re-
appears the consciousness, with its contents, that
had vanished ! It might as well not re-appear
at all. The gates of conscious life that were
closed might not open again. It is not in our
power to re-open them. But they do re-open.
The self-consciousness and object-consciousness
that had vanished re-manifest themselves and
re-enact the scenes of conscious life. That the
agent of this act cannot himself sleep, but
must be ever- waking, we have already seen in
some degree ; but it is necessary to explain this
truth at greater length.
Section 4 — Time and Events*
To understand that knowledge is an eternal
reality, — that there was no time when knowledge
* See Green's Lectures on the Philosophy of Kant in the
second volume of his works, pp. 72-81, "The Empirical
Reality of Time." See also an inconsistency of Kant on
the subject of time pointed out in Sec. F, of the same
lectures, pp. 50-57.
II RELATION OF TIME TO KNOWLEDGE II3
was not, that no time comes when knowledge
ceases to exist, and that no time will come when
knowledge will pass away— we must understand
the relation of time to knowledge. Those who
do not acknowledge the eternality of knowledge,
those who think that knowledge begins with the
origin of animal organisms, that the knowledge
of living beings ceases to exist at times, or that the
source and cause of the world is something that
was unconscious once, became conscious at some
undefined time, and may or will become un-
conscious at some other undefinable time, — the
fundamental error of these thinkers is that they
suppose time to be independent of knowledge —
imagine that there can be time without con-
sciousness. We now proceed to show their error.
We have already seen that space and all objects
in space depend on knowledge. If we can show
now that time and all events in time is depend-
ent on knowledge, all nature will be seen to be
within knowledge and the foundations of Ideal-
ism,— those of true Theology — will be firmly
laid. In the present section we shall discuss the
nature of time, and in the next the relation of
time to knowledge.
Space means the relation of 'here' and
'there' — the connection of different parts. The
114 TIME AND EVENTS
elements are nothing apart from the connection
and the connection nothing apart from the
elements. Space consists in the connection of
infinite parts ; and the necessary condition of
this connection is consciousness. The reader has
known this already with reference to space. As
space is something implying relation, so is time.
Time is the relation of 'now' and 'then'. The
reader may say that as 'now' itself implies time,
there is no need of its relation to 'then'. But
the fact is that mere 'now' means nothing.
Apart from its relation to 'then', 'now' has no
meaning. 'After' is meaningless without
relation to 'before', and 'before' has no meaning
without relation to 'after'. It is only the re-
lation of 'now' and 'then', 'before' and
'after' that is called time. Without relation to
one another 'now' and 'then', 'before' and 'after'
are meaningless, and the relation itself is
meaningless without the related facts 'now' and
'then', 'before' and 'after'. Time is a purely
relative term. It is meaningless except as a
relation between 'now' and 'then', 'before' and
'after.' 'Now' and 'then', 'before' and 'after' are not
mere abstract terms ; they imply events and have
no meaning except with reference to events. 'Now'
and 'then' mean 'this event' and 'that event' ;
II TIME MEANINGLESS WITHOUT EVENTS II5
'before' and 'after' mean an antecedent and a
sequent event. It may seem to the reader at
times as if 'now' and 'then', 'before' and 'after'
could have a meaning even without reference to
events — as if "the event has happened now"
might mean that 'now' has some meaning even
without the event ; but on thinking a little, he
will see that 'now' has no meaning except with
reference to the event. Events indeed may be
of various kinds ; but of whatever kind they may
be, 'now' vi/ill apply to each. From this it may
seem as if 'now' were some thing general and
events only particulars, — as if 'now' and 'this
event occurring now' were not the same thing.
But in fact the general has no meaning apart
from the particular. An event may be of any
kind, but without some event or other 'now' has
no meaning. Many a time comes when no ex-
ternal e^'ent — no event relating to the world in
space — takes place. It may seem at such a time
as if 'now' has a meaning even apart from events ;
but even at such a time events do occur. At
such a time, a flow of thoughts passes through our
minds and it is this which gives the meaning to
'now.' Through the want of the power of in-
trospection we fail to recognise these events as
events. The reader therefore sees that the real
H6 TIME AND EVENTS
CHAP.
meaning of 'now' and 'then', 'before' and 'after',
is 'an antecedent event' and 'a sequent event',
and that without reference to events these words
and phrases mean nothing. Consequently the
relation of things or facts we call time has events
for its related facts. Time = the relation of
antecedents and sequents. Time is nothing
apart from events. An eventless time is an un-
meaning and impossible thing. On the other
hand, a timeless event is also an unmeaning and
impossible thing. We have already said that
a relation is nothing apart from the objects
related, and the related objects themselves are
nothing apart from the relation. It is the objects
that give a meaning to the relation, and it is the
relation that gives meaning to the objects.
All events happen in time ; 'happening' means
happening in time. Every event is an event
happening now or then, but 'an event happening
now' has no meaning apart from its relation to
'an event happening then ; and vice versa. Every
event therefore is related to other events as antece-
dent or sequent,— there can be no event which is
not so related. An event unrelated to other events
is one that does not happen in time, that is, does
not happen at all. 'Happening', as we have seen,
means happening in time, and a timeless event
n 'an absolutely first event' 117
is an unmeaning and impossible thing. What
we are trying to explain is a self-evident truth,
and such a truth is seen as self-evident as soon
as its meaning is comprehended. It is only to
one who does not realise its meaning that it
appears to be not a truth. The reader has only
to read thoughtfully a number of times what has
been said on the subject, and its truth will be
evident to him.
It follows from what has been said — we men-
tion it only to make it explicit — that there can
be no event which is absolutely first or absolutely
last. A particular series of events — one before
which other events have occurred and after which
other events will occur — may indeed have a first
or a last event. Of the series a, b, c, d, — a may
be the first and d the last ; but an event before
which no other event has at all happened, or after
which no other event will at all happen, is an
impossibility. We can indeed talk of such an
event just as we have already spoken of and
may speak of several other absurd and self-
■ contradictory things ; but that we can talk of
such a thing does not make it any the less
absurd and self-contradictory. An absolutely
first event is one before which no other event
has happened ; it is a sequent unrelated to an
ii8
TIME AND EVENTS CHAP.
antecedent. But a sequent, as we have seen, is
unmeaning without reference to an antecedent.
Consequently the event in question is not an
absolutely first event, but has an antecedent.
But the reader will perhaps say that we are
arguing in a circle or fighting against an enemy
created by ourselves. He will perhaps say, "Why
call the event in question a sequent ? If it were
a sequent, it would indeed be necessarily related
to an antecedent." But really we are helpless
in the matter. 'An absolutely first event' can
mean nothing but one before which no other
event has occurred. It has therefore a 'before,'
and if a 'before,' — an antecedent time, — then an
antecedent event also, for an antecedent time
has no meaning without an antecedent event. As
we have already seen, time without events is un-
meaning and impossible. It is therefore evident
that 'a first event' can mean only 'the first
event of a particular series.' 'No other event
has happened before this' can only mean that
no event of this particular series or kind has
preceded it. Events belonging to other series
or of other kinds must have happened. An
absolutely first event, before which no other
event whatever happened, is something self-
contradictory and impossible.
J
II 'an absolutely last event' 119
Like an absolutely first event, an absolutely
last event also is an impossibility. xA.n absolutely
last event is an event after which no other event
happens, that is, which has an 'after', but not a
sequent. But 'after' has no meaning apart from
an event, an eventless time being unmeaning and
impossible. An absolutely last event, an event
after which no other event occurs, is therefore
an impossibility. In this case also as in the
preceding, it is to be remarked that with re-
ference to a particular series or kind of events
it may indeed be said that no other event
happened or will happen after it. But that
events of other series or kinds happened or
will happen after it, is a necessity. An absolutely
last event is something self-contradictory and
impossible.
One more truth needs to be made explicit.
We have seen that time without events is un-
meaning and impossible, so that there can be no
time in which no event occurs, and there cannot
be an absolutely first or an absolutely last event.
It is also clear then that between two events
there can be no time when no event occurs.
Such a time is an eventless time, a relation
without related objects, and is therefore some-
thing self-contradictory and impossible. The
120 TIME AND EVENTS CHAP.
existence of time means the existence of events
happening in time. B, instead of happening
immediately after A, may happen long after
it ; but in that case a number of events must
happen in the time intervening between A and B,
whether those events are or are not of the same
kind as A and B, or else this intervening time
has no meaning whatever. If nothing happens
immediately after A, then it has an 'after', but
no sequent. Similarly, if nothing happens
immediately before B, it follows that it has an
antecedent time without an antecedent event.
But we have already seen that 'before' and 'after'
have no meaning without antecedent and
sequent events. It is therefore evident that there
can be no time without events, — not a moment
when some event or other does not happen.
We saw before that there cannot be an abso-
lutely first event — an event with empty, un-
occupied time before it. We have then seen that
there cannot be an absolutely last event, — an
event with unoccupied time after it. We have
seen, to put the matter briefly, that all time
must be filled, — filled with events. Now, from
these truths the inference follows that events
form an infinite series — a series without be-
ginning and end. No event included in this
MEANING OF INFINITE TIME
endless series is unrelated or independent ; each
is necessarily related to each. That 'time is
infinite' is true in two senses. It means, first,
that events form an infinite series. It means,
secondly, that he who is the necessary condition
of this relation, the cause and support of this
infinite series of events, is himself infinite, that
is eternal. But we only mention this truth
here ; we shall explain it in its proper place.
Section 5 — Knowledge and Time*
Having seen v/hat time means, let us now
discuss the relation of knowledge to it. At the
very beginning of this discussion, let us remind
the reader of the conclusion of our first chapter,
that on self and not-self. Whatever we know,
knew or shall know, whatever we think, thought,
shall think or can think,^ — everything whose
existence is believable^ — depends on knowledge.
Events therefore depend on knowledge. Every
event is either the appearance or disappearance
of objects of knowledge ; consequently all events,
present, past and future, are objects of knowledge.
Events may be of two kinds. One kind of
* See Green's Prolegomena to Ethics, Chaps. I and II,
and Green's Lectures on the Philosophy of Kant (in his
Works Vol. II), Sees. C, F and I. See also Caird's Philosophy
of Kant (old edition), Part Second, Chaps, v— ix.
KNOWLEDGE A\D TIME CHAP.
events happens in things in space, for instance
my act of writing. Writing is possible only in
connection with paper, pen and ink, and all
these objects are in space. Events of this class
are called physical actions or events. There is
another kind of actions which have no relation
to space, at any rate no direct relation, for
example hearing among sensuous actions, and
the rise of such purely internal feelings as
pleasure, pain, love, hate. But both these kinds
of events depend on knowledge.
One word more before we proceed to our
main discussion. The reader has already become
somewhat familiar with the thing 'sensation'.
There is only one word more to be said about it.
Sensation has two forms. The one is its rise in
particular times and in relation to particular
antecedents. In this form we shall speak of it
as only an 'event'. The other is the form in
which it exists unchanged as the object of the
unchangeable conscious self, as eternally related
to it. In this form we shall often speak of it
as 'knowledge of events'. Gradually the reader
will see the distinction of these two forms of
sensation.
The reader has seen that time is nothing
apart from events and that events cannot exist
H TIME DEPENDS ON KNOWLEDGE 1 23
apart from knowledge. It has also been shewn
that events form an infinite series, and that this
infinite series of events is internally related, no
event being unrelated to another. It follows
therefore that there was no time when knowledge
was not, and that no time will come when there
will be no knowledge. And we get also a
glimpse of the truth that this knowledge, with-
out beginning and without end, is one and
indivisible. There was no time when there were
no events ; but events depend on knowledge ;
therefore there was no time when there was no
knowledge. No time will come when there will
be no events ; but events imply knowledge ;
therefore, no time will come when there will be
no knowledge. All events are mutually related ;
but objects cannot be related or connected unless
there is something common in them to connect
them. In this case knowledge or consciousness
is that common link. Consciousness, though
one and indivisible, experiences different sensa-
tions. Consciousness therefore is the uniting
principle of events, the condition of the relation
we call time. All events are connected, — past,
present and future are all linked together in
time ; knowledge or consciousness therefore is
one. That knowledge is the uniting principle
124 KNOWLEDGE AND TIME CHAP.
of events, the forger of the chain of time, and
therefore free from it, transcending it, — that it
is unborn, eternal and undying, — we now proceed
to explain somewhat more fully.
Let us suppose that four events, a, b, c, d,
occur ; for instance, I look at these four figures
successively, or touch this piece of paper four
times, one after another. That there was know-
ledge before the first of these events occurred,
that other events occurred before it and that
it is connected with them, the reader already
knows. But we do not count those events as
belonging to this series, and so have nothing to
say of them. However, consciousness, let us
suppose, which existed before the fiist of this
series, knows this event, that is, it manifests
itself as a sensation. Consciousness is necessary
even for this first event. Then, for the second
event to occur after the first, it is necessary that
the knower of the first should also know the
second and when knowing it remember the first.
The firstness of the first and the secondness of the
second both depend on this unity of conscious-
ness and this recollection. Unless the first and
the second were thus related, the first would not
be first and the second second, for 'first,' 'second',
&c., are all correlative terms. And their correla-
II CONSCIOUSKESS MAKES TIME 1 25
tion depends upon the unity of knowledge. Unless
antecedent and sequent, first and second, were
united in one consciousness — in one indivisible
act of knowing — their antecedence and sequence,
their firstness and secondness, would have no
meaning. If, with the passing away of the first
event, its knowledge too had passed away, had
disappeared altogether, the firstness of the first
and the secondness of the second would have
been impossible. It is because the knower did not
change or pass away with the event, but remain-
ing unchanged connected the remembrance of
the first event with the second, that the second-
ness of the second became possible. Similarly,
the occurrence of the third event also depends
upon the same consciousness, and it is because
the latter remained unchanged and connected
the recollection of the first and the second event
with the third, that its thirdness became possible.
The same holds good of the fourth and the
following events. The reader therefore sees that
consciousness is the real maker of time or the
chain of events. In the first place, the very
possibility of an event depends on consciousness.
In the second place, as events are in their very
nature fugitive, occurring this moment and
passing away in the next, time as a relation or
126 KNOWLEDGE AND TIME
events as a series would never be possible unless
the recollection of such fugitive objects persisted
in a conscious self. Unless it so persisted, re-
lations like 'before' and 'after', 'now' and 'then'
would not be possible at all. It is because the
knowledge of 'before' persists, that 'after' be-
comes possible. It is because the knowledge of
'now' does not pass away even when 'now'
passes away, that 'then' becomes possible. It
will thus be seen that knowledge is the support
and cause of time. It is the relation of 'now'
and 'then,' of 'before' and 'after,' of 'past' and
'present,' that we call time. But it is only con-
sciousness— consciousness that persists and does
not pass away — that can establish this relation.
'Before' and 'after' can be connected by that
alone w^hich does not pass away with the lapse
of events, which, in losing 'before' does not lose
itself, which, even when the antecedent is past,
keeps hold of its knowledge and connects it with
the knowledge of the sequent. It is conscious-
ness alone which can do all this ; consciousness
therefore is the support of the relation, the maker
of the chain, which we call time.
Now, it is evident from what we have already
said that the maker of the chain of time, the
cause and condition of the relation we call time.
n CONSCIOUSNESS ABOVE TIME 1 27
cannot itself be in time, — subject to time. Con-
sciousness cannot be one of the things whose
relation we call time. That without relation to
which events cannot occur, whose persistence
and unchangeableness is itself the cause and
condition of changes taking place and forming
a series, cannot itself come into being and pass
away. What we call the birth, life, and death
of a conscious being are events or series of events
requiring consciousness. Consciousness being the
cause and condition of these events, it must it-
self be above birth, death and change. It is
clear therefore that the Consciousness which
forms the essence of our life, which manifests
itself as the light and support of all that we
know, which, taking the form of an infinite
variety of sensations, and uniting them with its
synthetic power, manifests itself as this wonder-
ful world, which disappears in sleep and oblivion
irrespectively of our individual volitions, and
re-appearing in awakening and memory in the
same involuntary way forms the web of our
conscious life, which we mistake for and take
pride in as merely our individual consciousness, but
which is entirely independent of our individual
volitions and the very root of our voluntary
activity — this Consciousness, we say, is unborn,
128 KNOWLEDGE AND TIME
undying, eternal, without beginning and without
end. That our individual lives have a beginning,
is doubtless. But what does this beginning mean ?
It means the beginning of a series of events,
not the beginning of the consciousness forming
the cause and support of this series. This con-
sciousness existed before the beginning of this
series. The events preceding this series, though
not belonging to it, are necessarily connected
with it, and the condition of this connection is
the unity of consciousness. The preceding events
are related to this series as its antecedents, and
this relation would be impossible unless the
consciousness forming the support of this series
were identical with that forming the support
of the other. It is evident therefore that this
Consciousness is without beginning, eternal. That
it is without end, undying, needs, we hope, no
separate proof ; the truth will be evident if the
line of argument given above be applied to it.
Let the reader think how great a thing each one
of us is holding in his bosom, — how great a thing
is manifesting itself with everyone of our sensa-
tions, thoughts, feelings and actions ! Let him
think of this and wonder. He who is the support
of the infinite variety of events which science
speaks of, he who is the actor of that grand and
GOD IK MAN I2g
wonderful drama, is manifest here as the maker
of this small drama of my life. He who held
and whirled in his hand the fiery gas from which
the present universe arose, who scattered un-
numbered suns, planets and satellites in infinite
space, who is bringing out millions over millior.s
of cosmic phenomena through millions and
millions of years, who is creating, preserving and
destroying millions of living beings, who is lead-
ing the world on through endless stages of pro-
gress— it is that infinite Wisdom and Power
which shines here as my consciousness — as the
support of my life ! We need not say more.
If the reader thoughtfully reads what we have
said above, he will see that we indulge in no
poetic fancy, that our words are not a baseless
and passing outburst of sentiment, but that
they are necessary truths from which no escape
is possible.
Section 6 — The Omniscience of God
From the exposition given above of the truth
that consciousness is the maker of the chain of
time, the source of the stream of events consti-
tuting the world, it follows clearly that God is
omniscient. We have shewn that though events
are passing, the knowledge of events does not
9
130 THE OMNISCIENCE OF GOD CHAP.
pass, but is permanent. As we have seen, events
such as a, b, c, d, occur successively, but the
knowledge of each of them persists, and uniting
with the knowledge of the sequent makes it
possible for us to know that it is the sequent.
Though events pass away, their knowledge per-
sists as a permanent property of the knower.
Let the reader now understand clearly the dis-
tinction of events and the knowledge of events.
Events pass away, but the knowledge of events
does not pass, but persists. Events indeed cannot
happen without relation to consciousness, but the
very nature of an event is that it is now, but the
next moment is not ; one moment's event does
not last the next moment, which comes with
a fresh event. The stream of events is more
rapid than even that of a most rapidly
flowing river. The water of such a river does
not stop more than a moment in a single spot.
Even so is the stream of events, — events following
events moment after moment. But the knowledge
of events does not pass away. While the stream
of events flows, their knowledge stands still as
it were on the banks : it does not flow with
them. Events are related to one another as
antecedents and sequents. Between the first and
the last event of a series there is always some
n KNOWLEDGE OF EVENTS NOT AN EVENT I31
distance of time ; but the knowledge of these
events exists in the self as an indivisible fact.
It indeed exists in the self as the knowledge of
successive events, but there is no succession of
events, no distance of time, in it. The events are
successive, but there is no succession in the
knowledge of successive events. In fact, unless
the knowledge of successive events takes the form
of an indivisible fact or act of knowing, it can-
not be called a knowledge of events. It is
therefore evident that though events are subject
to time, the knowledge of events is not so, — it is
not in time at all. And what is not subject to
time, not in time at all, can never flow or pass
away. It follows therefore that the knowledge
of events, whether it is manifested or not in
our individual lives, is imperishable, eternal.
When it is manifested in individual life, we see
that it is of a nature opposite to that of events,
so that, even when it disappears from individual
life, we do not suspect that it will perish. To
flow, to pass, to perish, is not in its nature, —
is opposed to its nature. We are going to show
at some length how the knowledge of events
known to us re-appears even after disappearing
from our individual life, and thus proves that
it is not an event or series of events, but some-
132 THE OMXISCIEXCE OF GOD CHAP.
thing timeless and imperishable. But perhaps
the knowledge of many events does not appear
more than once in individual life, and there
is no certainty that the knowledge of those
which have appeared a number of times will
appear again. But the very nature of knowledge
is such, it is so deeply stamped with permanence,
that even if it has only once manifested itself,
we know it to be imperishable. It is not indeed
ever-present in our individual lives, but it
cannot be doubted that it exists permanently in
the one indivisible Consciousness which forms
the cause and basis of our individual lives,
which is infinitely larger than these lives, and
in relation to which the knowledge of every
event manifests itself. What piece of knowledge
indeed remains permanently in our individual
life ? We have shewn that the Consciousness
which manifests itself as our life and knowledge,
and which is in its nature a unity-in-difference^
is unborn, undying, and ever-wakeful. But in
sound sleep, we everyday become entirely un-
conscious. At that time, the eternal Conscious-
ness ceases to manifest itself as our individual
consciousness. But this disappearance on its
part is not its destruction ; for it re-manifests
itself as the light of our life after the hours of
II THE WITNESS OF MEMORY I33
sleep. In the same manner, the disappearance
of particular pieces of knowledge is not their
destruction. As the fundamental Consciousness
remains imperishable and eternal, despite its
occasional disappearance, so the particular pieces
of knowledge related to and identical with it
— the knowledge of particular events — remain
imperishable in it despite their occasional dis-
appearance from individual life.
That particular pieces of knowledge, the
knowledge of particular events, though occasion-
ally disappearing from our individual life, do
exist permanently in the Consciousness which is
the basis of our life, and re-appearing in our
individual life, make our individual experience
possible— this we shall prove and illustrate by a
few examples.
Suppose I perceive the table before me, see
it and touch it, and then going away from it,
attend to other things and forget it. At another
moment, let us suppose, I perceive it again, or
without perceiving it, remember it somehow or
other. Having perceived it, I recognize it as the
table known before, or having remembered it,
I see that it is the recollection of the same table
that I perceived before. What makes this re-
membrance possible ? If the consciousness of
134 THE OMNISCIENCE OF GOD CHAP.
objects were merely an event, a passing and
perishable thing, if it were not a timeless, im-
perishable thing, the object-consciousness that
had once left the mind would never have returned
to it. But in this fact of recollection we see
that it is the old object-consciousness that has
come back. Certain fresh events indeed take
place in seeing and touching the table again ;
but there is no doubt that what has returned
is the old knowledge. Recollection is not
possible without a union of the past and the
present ; but past time has passed away for
ever, and can never return. Past events are
gone for ever, and it is fresh events that are
taking place in the present. What, then, related
to the past, comes back and makes recollection
possible? It is the knowledge of the past — ^the
knowledge of past events — which did not pass
away, did not perish with the events— it is that
timeless, imperishable knowledge that has re-
appeared in the present and uniting the old and
the new made recollection possible. Events
in the form of sensations of colour, taste etc., that
had happened when the table was first perceived,
passed away immediately, and it is fresh events
that are happening now. But if with the passing
of those events the knowledge of them had also
II THE WITNESS OF MEMORY I35
perished, if that knowledge had not escaped the
lapse of time and reappeared now, the knowledge
of the similarity of the old and the new would
not have been possible ; consequently there
would not have been such a thing as recollection,
and in the absence of a consciousness of the
past, the knowledge that the new is new, would
also have been impossible. The reader therefore
sees that though the knowledge of the past
sometimes leaves our fmite and forgetful mind,
disappears from our individual life, it nevertheless
re-appears in the form of recollection and declares
its own imperishableness. On the one hand, we are
forgetful, and are every now and then forgetting
almost everything connected with our life ; but on
the other hand, there is in us as the eternal support
of our life, as our very consciousness, One who
forgets nothing, and who brings back forgotten
things to us when they are needed. If he did
not re-manifest himself in us with the knowledge
of the past, our life would be quite impossible. Life
without memory is not life, — consciousness without
remembrance is no consciousness. It is because
the remembrance of him who forgets nothing is
manifested in us, that our life becomes possible.
It is because the knowledge of the All-knowing is
manifested as our knowledge, that we know.
136 THE OMNISCIEN'CE OF GOD CHAP.
As from a contemplation of memory and
oblivion it is seen that, though our individual
finite mind is forgetful, the Supreme Self who
is the support of our life, forgets nothing, and that
our memory is the re-appearance of his knowledge
in our mind, so from a contemplation of sleep and
re-awaking it is seen that though our indivi-
dual life is subject to sleep, the Supreme Self
whose consciousness we share is ever-wakeful.
In the state of sleep, all our knowledge rests in
him, and his re-appearance at its end as our
consciousness with that knowledge is our awak-
ing. Sleep appears to be the destruction of all
our knowledge — of self-consciousness as well as
the consciousness of objects. What is sleep —
sound sleep — unless one becomes wholly un-
conscious ? This is scarcely a wrong description
of sleep so far as our individual life is concerned.
In fact our individual finite mind becomes un-
conscious in that state, and knowledge entirely
disappears from our individual life ; or else
sound sleep would have no meaning. But if
our individual life were all-in-all, if the ever-
wakeful Supreme Self were not the support of
our life, our very consciousness, there would be
no difference between sound sleep and death,
between re-awaking and re-birth. In that case,
f
THE EVER-WAKEFUL I 37
our sleep would be equivalent to death, and
re-awaking to re-birth or fresh birth. If the
disappearance of self-consciousness and object-
consciousness in sound sleep were their real
destruction, we should, at the termination of sleep,
awake — or rather 'awaking' is not applicable
here — be created as fresh beings. In that case
there would be no identity between self-
consciousness as before sleep with self-conscious-
ness as after it and no consciousness of identity
or similarity between objects perceived before
sleep and those perceived after it. For a feeling
of identity between the former and the latter
self-consciousness, the former must not pass away
but remain intact and re-appear along with the
latter. If self-consciousness were to lapse, it
could not come back, — its coming back would
indeed be a meaningless expression. What would
come or rise at a succeeding time would be a
fresh thing. That the same thing is true of
object-consciousness, has already been shown.
The re-appearance, therefore, of our self-cons-
ciousness and object-consciousness after sleep
proves beyond a doubt that though in the hours
of sound sleep they do not appear in our indi-
vidual life, they are not then destroyed, but
remain intact in the Supreme Self who is our
138 THE OMNISCIENCE OF GOD CHAP.
consciousness. When we are fast asleep, he re-
mains wakeful and holds in his hand our entire
conscious life, and at the termination of sleep re-
manifests himself as our consciousness and there-
by makes us re-awake. It is this which makes
possible the identity of both our self-consciousness
and object-consciousness, in fact our entire
experience.
If the knowledge of events is eternal, it
follows, besides, that the knowledge of those
events which took place before the beginning of
our individual life, existed and do exist eternally
in the Supreme Self. The events to which history
and tradition bear testimony, the endless variety
which the different sciences discover, the far far
off past of which science itself knows nothing,
were and are doubtless objects of the Infinite and
Eternal Mind. He who is the Maker of the chain
of time, who unites all events by his eternal
knowledge, cannot lose the smallest piece of
knowledge, cannot forget even the most fugitive
event. It is evident, therefore, that though the
greater part of the universe is hidden from our
individual consciousness, and though the part
of it known disappears from it every now and
then, it is ever-present as an object of the eternal
knowledge of God.
II GOD S KNOWLEDGE OF THE FUTURE I39
Since, despite the transiency of events, the
knowledge of events is timeless and permanent,
another truth, already hinted at, is proved from the
same fact. As the knowledge of events is timeless,
it is evident that it not only lasts after events, but
exists before the occurring of events. Though
it appears with events, it is not born with them.
Events are indeed its manifestations, but they
are not its birth ; it exists before them. From
the distinction we have already pointed out
between events and the knowledge of events, it
is evident that the latter not only cannot perish,
but cannot be born. Its very nature being the
very reverse of a flow, a succession, — the relation
called time not at all entering into it, — it can
neither come into nor pass out of existence. It
follows, therefore, that all that has happened exist-
ed before its happening in the eternal knowledge
of God, and that all that will happen already
exists in that knowledge. Sharing in a very
small degree in the Eternal Consciousness, we know
only so much of its nature and mode of mani-
festation that an infinite series of events has
happened in the past and an infinite series will
happen in future. But we know very little
what particular events have occurred in the past,
and much less what will happen in the future.
140 THE MYSTERY OF CREATION CHAP.
But to him who is the source of events, the
Maker of the chain of time, nothing can be un-
known. The past and the future must be as
clear to him as the present. Since nothing exists
apart from him, since all events have happened,
are happening and will happen in relation to
him, all must be known to him. From the fixed
unalterable laws which guide the actions of
nature, science infers the nature of events that
took place before the birth of sentient beings
and the rise of sensations. It records the childhood
and youth of the present world and makes sure
predictions about its future. These laws are
only the modes of God's self-manifestation, —
the modes in which he reveals himself in the
form of this variegated and wonderful world of
sense. To him, therefore, neither the past, the
present nor the future can be unknown. He is
all-knowing, all-seeing, — ever shining in his own
eternal light.
Section 7 — The Mystery of Creation
We said in the beginning of this chapter that
we would prove the eternality of knowledge
and thereby show the error of May^vada. The
reader perhaps sees that error now. That theory
emphasises only the aspect of oneness and eternal-
IT THE FINITE RELATIVE, KOT ILLUSORY I4I
ity in knowledge ; it does not see that there is a
necessary duality in it and that an Eternal un-
related to change is unmeaning. We have shown
the error of the M4y4 theory by explaining these
two truths. But we must admit that though
we have shown the error of the May^ theory,
we have not been able to explain the mystery
of creation. It is indeed evident that the stream
of creation, without beginning and without end,
is flowing on in relation to a Supreme Being
who is infmite, eternal, omniscient, all-com-
prehending, and the life of the individual
self, its finite knowledge and power being a
reflection of his infinite knowledge and power.
There can be no doubt that the world and the
individual self are relative truths dependent on
God, and are not illusions. But we cannot say
that we clearly understand how change takes
place in relation to the Unchanging and the
finite exists in the Infinite. Creation is still a
mystery to us and we doubt if man will ever be
able fully to explain this mystery. We proceed
to show what the mystery is. We have said that
though the stream of events is ever-flowing, the
knowledge of events exists eternally in the
Supreme Self. Past, present and future all exist
in his knowledge. What has happened was
142 THE MYSTERY OF CREATION CHAP.
known to him before it happened, and what will
happen is already known to him. Now, the
question is, If it be so, what is the meaning of
happening, of events, of change ?
If everything is ever-present to God, what is
the meaning of the past and the future ? What
does time mean at all ? We have seen that an
event means the appearance or disappearance of
an idea, of a known object. But appearance
and disappearance are impossible to the eternal
Consciousness. To it everything is ever-present,
ever-manifest. For appearance and disappea-
rance, therefore, an individual self or a number
of such selves is necessary. It is to such selves
alone — in the conscious life of such selves — that
the appearance and disappearance of the eternal
ideas of the Divine mind is possible. Creation
or change, then, comes to mean the origination
of the individual self from the Supreme Self, the
continuance of the stream of individual life in
him and, if possible, its final merging in him.
The whole process of creation — origination,
preservation and dissolution — is the manifestation
of the Universal Life in the individual, whether
the individual be a man, or some being higher or
lower than man. It was shown in the first
chapter that in the world of space there is no
THE MYSTERY DEFIKED I43
such thing as an unconscious reality. In this
chapter it has been shown that in the world of
time also there is no such reality or any event which
is the change of such a reality, — that every
change is a change that relates to consciousness,
to God, and that to suppose an independent
material world and changes in such a world, is
due to ignorance. It will now be seen that there
is a sense in which the material world may be
called illusory, as the Mayivadin calls it. But
the M^y^v^din goes further. He says that there
has really been no creation,- — that origination,
preservation and dissolution, — all events, all
changes, are illusory, imaginary. But we have
shown that creation is not imaginary, that events
form a series without beginning and end, and are
a reality dependent on God. But is the meaning
we have given to creation, namely that it is
the manifestation of the Divine Life as the life of
the individual, a perfectly intelligible one ? What
is in him eternally, he manifests as the life of
the individual — he, the ever-manifest, eternally
revealed to himself, manifests himself partly in
the stream of time — is not this a mystery ? How
does he who is eternal manifest himself as the
changing world and the changing life of the
individual, remaining eternal all the same ? How
144 THE MYSTERY OF CREATION CHAP.
does he who is all-knowing appear as ignorant
in the life of the individual ? There can be no
doubt that he does so, and it is also true that an
Eternal and Infinite unrelated to the changing
and the finite is meaningless. Nevertheless, the
Eternal becoming changeful and at the same time
remaining eternal, the All-knowing becoming
ignorant and at the same time remaining all-
knowing, the Infinite becoming finite and at the
same time remaining infinite — all this seems to
involve a contradiction. This apparent contra-
diction is the mystery of creation, and it is his
failure to explain this mystery that leads the
M^y^vadin to call creation illusory, due to
ignorance, and to ascribe to God a power under
the name of 'Miyl' as the cause of this ignorance.
He calls it 'May^,' (an illusion-producing power)
because it makes us mistake as real what is
unreal. But the ascription of such a power
to God does not in the least explain the mystery
of creation. If error is real, so is the individual,
the subject of error. If the individual were un-
real, to whom would real error belong ? And if
the individual is real, the power which produces
or manifests it cannot be called May^ — a power of
illusion. We thus see clearly the error of i\My^-
vida. This theory deserves respect so far that
II REALITY OF THE INDIVIDUAL I45
it sees the mystery of creation — sees that creation
is not perfectly intelligible. But its attempt to
solve the mystery is a failure. Its conclusion —
that creation is illusory, imaginary, — is evident-
ly an error. However, that the individual is not
illusory, not due to Maya, not merely vydvahdvika,
conventional, — that it is paramarthika, real, and
that the moral relation of God to man, God's
love and holiness, are svarupa lakshanas, absolute
attributes, and not merely tatastha lakshanas,
relative attributes — all this we shall explain to
the best of our power in our third and fourth
chapters.
10
CHAPTER III
UNITY AND DIFFERENCE
Section i — the Unity and Infinitude of God
We have already tried to show that the
Consciousness which supports the world is one
and indivisible, and that the human conscious-
ness is a reproduction of that Consciousness. We
have also seen that there is an element of
necessary difference in that indivisible Conscious-
ness. However, we shall discuss this subject
more particularly in this chapter.
We have seen in our first chapter that space
is an affair of infinite addition, that it consists
of infinite parts infinitely divisible and that the
link uniting these parts is consciousness. It is
because these parts exist together in the
presence of an indivisible Consciousness that they
are connected. In fact their connection means
nothing more than their presence to such a
Consciousness, This connection, which we call
SPACE ONE AND INFINITE I47
space, is one and infinite. Each of us perceives
at a time only a small portion of space, and each
perceives a distinct portion. But we know that
there is more space, infinite space, beyond the
portion which each one of us perceives. We
have already seen that space is a necessary form
of perception, that we cannot perceive, think
or believe space as absent. Therefore, though
our direct perception is confined to very small
limits, we are sure that infinite space extends
beyond these limits. Though infinitely divisible
on the one hand, space, we know, is infinitely
addible on the other. We cannot imagine any
limit to space. That we cannot imagine any
limit to space, is not merely a weakness of our
minds, — space itself is an affair of infinite addi-
tion. It means nothing more than such an
affair. This matter is so simple and clear that
we feel it is not necessary to say much upon it.
The reader may, if he pleases, try to see if he
can think space as having a limit. To think
that space has a limit, one must suppose it as
ending somewhere beyond which there is no
space. But to suppose a 'beyond' is to think of
space outside the fancied limit. It is impossible
to think of a limit to space, — the idea itself being
absurd and meaningless. Now, as it is necessary
THE UKITY AND IXFIXITUDE OF GOD
that space should be thought of as infinite, so
it is necessary to think of it as one. As we have
seen, space consists of the connection, the unity,
of different parts, parts which, though distinct,
are inseparable. No portion of space can be
separated from any other portion. Two distinct
parts of space may lie millions of miles apart
from each other, but they are united by the
intervening portions of space which are connected
with them and with one another. Each of us
indeed perceives different portions of space, but
these portions are connected in the way already
mentioned. All spaces are included in one in-
finite space. In knowing this one infinite space
we know the Infinite Consciousness in relation to
which it exists — the same consciousness that we
call our own. It is this consciousness which lies
at the basis of this affair of infinite addition.
The infinitude of space really means the infinitude
of God, both being different aspects or expressions
of the same truth. That time also is one and
infinite, that the one and indivisible Cons-
ciousness is the maker of this infinite chain of
time, and that he is eternal and knows all time,
past, present and future — we have explained at
length in our last chapter, and nothing more
need be said about it here. We hope now that
THE OXE IN THE MAN'V 149
the reader sees somewhat clearly the main argu-
ment for the infinitude of God in relation to space
and time, and for his unity and indivisibility.
It will be seen that as, in order to understand
the eternality of God, it is not necessary to know
the innumerable events of infinite time, nay, not
•even a large number of events, a comprehension of
the nature of time and change being enough to give
us an idea of the Timeless, the Eternal, to convince
us that consciousness, the consciousness that consti-
tutes our self, is eternal, so, in order to see that God
is infinite and all-comprehending, it is not necess-
ary to know everything in space, nay, not even
a large number of things. To know the nature of
space is to know the nature of the Spaceless, the
Infinite. \Mien the relation of two portions of
space is known, it is seen that the consciousness
that connects the one with the other is spaceless,one,
indivisible, infinite. The mind that knows two
things to be different is in both of them indiffer-
ently as their support. The difference is not
without but within the mind. The unity is
fundamental, primary, the difference secondary.
He who knows both 'here' and 'there', is equally
in both. He who knows both 'far' and 'near'
is equally in both. In fact 'far' and 'near' are
applicable only to the body, they are unmeaning
150 UMTY-IK-DIFFERENCE CHAP.
with reference to the self, 'far' and 'near' both
existing in relation to the self. It will thus be
seen that in knowing space, we know the knower,
the support, of space as spaceless. In knowing
the elements of difference, division, mediateness-
and plurality existing in space, we know the
consciousness that supports space — the same
that we call our own consciousness — as one, in-
divisible, immediate and one. These two aspects,
or moments of knowledge are so closely related,
that it is impossible to separate them. These
two classes of truths — oneness and difference,
unity and duality, divisibility and indivisibility,
mediacy and immediacy, the one and the many,
are so mixed up in knowledge, that it is in their
union that knowledge is possible. Abstract one
of them, and knowledge becomes impossible.
Unity-in-difference is a fundamental and necessary
characteristic of knowledge.
Section 2 — Unity-in-difference
It is doubtful if the above proof of the funda-
mental unity of consciousness will be satisfactory
to all. To it it will be naturally objected that
we evidently see consciousness to be many in
number. The self of each individual is distinct
and apart from one another. Each of us knows,.
Ill THE UNDERLYING UNITY 151
understands and thinks separately. In the pre-
sence of this apparent difference, is not the proof
of the unity of consciousness only a metaphysical
ingenuity ? How many times it has been admit-
ted in the first chapter of this book that the
sensorium of each of us is distinct. How is it
asserted now that the same consciousness is the
support and life of each individual ? Now, we
proceed to answer this objection to the best of
our power. There is indeed no doubt that each
of us knows distinctly, that one's sensations are
not the sensations of another, one's memory
not the memory of another, and one's actions
not the actions of another. It is not our purpose
to deny this infinite difference in the world.
To deny it is possible only to the extremely
foolish or the blind. But we are going to show
that there is a wonderful unity in the midst of
this infinite diversity. The sensoriums and
understandings of different people are indeed
different, but not unconnected ; there is a wonder-
ful connection, a wonderful unity, between them.
The only explanation of this unity is that the
same Consciousness lies at the root of all. If
the individual selves were quite apart from one
another, it is certain that they could not know
one another, — that no connection between
152 UMTV-IK-DIFFEREN'CE CHAP.
self and self would be possible. But we find a
wonderful unity among individual selves. They
are connected by knowledge, feeling and action.
If the consciousness of niy friend before me were
not fundamentally the same as mine, I could by
no means know that he is. In that case even
the thought of his existence would not have
risen in my mind. I should then have been shut
up in the closed and solitary chamber of my
life, and the states of my own mind would have
been the only objects of my knowledge. But
the fact is that I know him and that though my
sensorium and understanding are different from
his, a wonderful mental intercourse is going
on between us. I not only know his existence,
but am exchanging thoughts and feelings with
him. I express my thoughts, and he knows and
understands them. He gives out his own
thoughts, and I know and understand them.
An interchange of feelings, of love, esteem,
sympathy &c., is proceeding between us. What
makes all this possible ? The effort I make in
uttering my words is my individual action. The
sound I hear as the result of my effort is a
sensation of my individual mind. The mind of
my friend is not under the control of my will,
and yet by some mysterious means sounds similar
ni EXPLANATION OF SPIRITUAL INTERCOURSE I53
to those I hear are produced in his mind, the
meanings I understand are understood by him,
and the feelings of pleasure or pain I experience
are experienced by him. This connection bet-
ween self and self, this exchange of thoughts
and feelings between them, cannot have any
other reasonable explanation than this that the
same Consciousness lies at the root of the con-
nected selves. The connection of different things
implies something common in them. That my
thoughts and feelings become the thoughts
and feelings of another mind, can only mean
that the underlying" Consciousness of both minds
is the same. The same Spiritual Principle, it is
evident, lies at the root of both lives, binds them
together and makes them dance to the same
tune. Either we must say that there is no
•connection between different minds, each existing
alone, confined to its own subjective states, that
the wonderlully rich and varied spiritual rela-
tions of the world are quite illusory, or we must
admit that the same Infinite Consciousness under-
lies all individual minds as the common source of
their thoughts and feelings and makes these
relations possible.
The more the reader thinks of these spiritual
relations, the more will he wonder and the
154 UNITY-IN-DIFFERENCE
more will this grand faith be confirmed in him that
underlying the innumerable diversities of the
world there is a single undivided Conscious-
ness which binds together all varieties, all space
and all time. This spiritual relation is not
confined to persons near one another ; it knows
no distance of time and space. I share in the
same thought that inspired the sage Emerson
on the other side of the globe. His and my
mental phenomena are indeed numerically
different, and yet our thoughts are at bottom
one ! The sentiment that thrills in the songs
of the English poet Tennyson* touches my heart
and makes it thrill with the same feeling. The
union of my heart with his is undoubted. The
same hymn of praise that transported the soul
of the ancient sages of India, uplifts my soul too
and knits me in spiritual communion with them. In
the same way, the profound meditation of Buddha,
the deep wisdom of Plato, the living faith of Jesus,
and the enraptured love of Chaitanya draw my
soul and bind me in a deep spiritual relationship
to these great souls, far apart as they are from
one another in time and space. Either these
relations are imaginary and meaningless, or,
if they are true in any sense, if they have any
* The poet was living when this was written.
Ill PRESENCE OF THE INFINITE IN UNIVERSAL TRUTHS I55
meaning, it is evident that an undivided, all-
pervading Consciousness constituting the life of
all rational beings is the only explanation, the
only cause, of these relations.
Look at the other side of this truth, the one
we have briefly shown in the first part of this
chapter. On the one hand, I am only a small
individual confined in time and space, my
direct knowledge restricted to very small
limits. I can perceive at a time only a very
small portion of time and space, and the
direct objects of my sensuous knowledge
are only my individual sensations. But on the
other hand I know infinite time and space. I do
not indeed know all the particulars that fill
infinite time and space, but in one sense, in a
real sense, I know infinite time and space. The
particular objects that occupy particular portions
of space, the particular events that occur in
particular times, are not indeed fully known to
me ; they are not indeed manifested in my
individual life ; but the universal truths relating
to time and spece, truths that lie at the basis
of all knowledge, truths that are self-evident and
necessary, are clearly known to me. That space
is one and infinite, that events form an infinite
series, that past, present and future are knit
156 UXITY-IN-DIFFERENCE CHAP.
together in an indissoluble link, and that the
unity of knowledge is the condition of all relations
— these necessary truths are certainly known
to me. These truths are the necessary forms of
all knowledge. However different, therefore,
knowledge may be with reference to particular
matters, however various may be the forms
assumed by knowledge in particular times and
spaces in relation to particular objects, I know
surely its general forms. And I know even
more. I know to a large extent the various
thoughts, feelings and volitions of different minds.
Though restricted to small limits of time and
space with reference to direct perception, 1 know
many truths relating to very distant places and
very ancient times. From this it is evident that
there is in me a strange combination of the great
and the small, the finite and the infinite, the
individual and the universal. On the one hand,
I am small, finite and individual ; but on the
other hand there is in me something that is really
very great, in fact nothing less than infinite and
universal. It is because the Infinite exists in me
as my Higher Self, my Supreme Self, that I can
transcend my individuality, can know thruths
beyond my individual life, can acquire necessary
and universal truths, and can hold communion
in MAN NOT MERELY FINITE 157
with the Infinite. A merely finite being, a mere
individual, far from knowing any other higher
truths, cannot even know that he is finite and
individual. But one who has known himself to
be finite and individual, has, in knowing only this
much, transcended his finitude and individuality.
One who can go beyond onself, can know truths
outside his individual life, can acquire universal
truths, is not merely finite, merely individual ;
the finite and the infinite, individuality and
universality, are inseparably blended in him. As
it is true on the one hand that we are finite and
individual, so it is equally true on the other that
the infinite, universal and all-knowing Being is
the cause, support and light of our finite and in-
dividual lives. Knowledge everywhere is charac-
terised by this necessary unity and difference.
Every individual self is lighted by the Infinite-
Light.*
Section 3 — Dualism, Monism and the Doctrine
OF Unity-in-difference
The reader must already have seen that
the Theism we are trying to establish in this
* See Principal Caird's Introduction to the Philosophy of
Religion : the latter portions of chaps. IV and V and
portions of chap. VIII.
158 DUALISM, MONISM AND UNITY-IN-DIFFERENCE CHAP.
treatise is different both from current Dualism
and current Monism. The Dualism which ima-
gines God and man to be entirely apart from
each other, is not real Theism, but only a
species of Deism. When such a Dualism
says that God is the support of the world and
the life of man, it really contradicts itself. A
God from which man and the world can exist
apart, independently, cannot be their support.
Such a Dualism is really opposed to deep worship
and spiritual communion. If God is outside my
self, how can he know and move my heart ? And
how is it possible for me to see, hear and
touch him, to have any deep relations with
him ? Those among the Dualists who are not
very thoughtful, may hold the truths about man's
<ieeper relations to God as blind beliefs, and
may be devoted to the culture of deep spiritual-
ity. But it seems evident that the more thought-
ful and subtle among them will often doubt
these deeper truths and will evince no depth
of communion and fervent love. On the other
hand, current Monism too, which denies the
element of necessary difference in knowledge,
cannot be called true Theism. Such Monism
declares God to be a subject without objects,
an Eternal without relation to change, and an
Ill SPIRITUAL DEFECTS OF MONISM AND DUALISM I59
Infinite without relation to the finite. Blinded by
Mayavada, it denies the reality of objects, changes
and limits. But a subject apart from objects has
no meaning. An unchangeable unrelated to change
is meaningless. The Infinite ceases to have any
sense if the reality of limits is denied. Objects,
changes and limits are undoubtedly relative.
They doubtless depend on the subject, the
eternal and the infinite. But because they are
relative, they do not cease to be true. They are
relatively true. Current Monism, by denying
their truth, makes its Absolute unmeaning.
An Absolute without necessary relations with
objects, changes and limits is no Absolute. By
the Absolute we mean something great which
supports objects, events and limits, and because
it supports them, is distinct from them. The
Monist's Absolute, therefore, which is without
difference, is no Absolute. The only real Absolute
is he who is at once one and different, who is a
Subject eternally supporting objects, an Eternal
•ceaselessly producing change and an Infinite
€ver sustaining the finite. Objects, change and
finite selves eternally exist in him as powers,
properties or manifestations. Objects and events
are real, though relative, to the Subject and the
Eternal. That they eternally exist in the Subject
l6o DUALISM, MOXISM AND UN'ITY-IN-DIFFERENCE CHAP.
and the Eternal, that the knowledge of objects
is ever-present to the Subject, and that events
form an infinite series, we have already shown.
We shall now speak a word or two on the
real existence of finite knowledge in the Infinite.
This consciousness I call my own, which is the
essence of my life, is doubtless the manifestation
of the Infinite Consciousness. But as, on the one
hand, it is undoubted that it is a manifestation
of the Infinite Consciousness, so, on the other
hand, there is no doubt that it is finite, that it
is only a partial reproduction of the Infinite.
Its difference from the Infinite Consciousness is
therefore as true as its unity with it. Its partial
and finite character is real, and not imaginary
or due to ignorance. It is not through error
that I suppose my knowledge to be finite ; its
finitude is real, undeniable. Though knowing
and fully admitting my knowledge to be one
with the infinite knowledge, I am obliged to
say that it is only a part of that knowledge.
That I, seated in this room, perceive only the
objects contained in it and do not perceive those
out of it, that my knowledge of various other
things is limited, that I can do only a fixed
number of things and cannot do many more,
that I can love only a small number of persons and
REALITY OF LIMITS l6l
cannot love all, that the holiness I have acquired
is imperfect, that my faults are numberless, —
these are not fancies due to ignorance, but facts.
To be brief — the existence of the finite is un-
doubted. Besides, though this, my life, was
manifested at a particular time, yet it is
doubtless that it ever existed in the Eternal
Mind. It follows therefore that the Infinite
Consciousness, notwithstanding its perfection
and indivisibility, eternally holds within itself
the limitations and imperfections of the world.
The Monist's Infinite, without difference and
activity, is not the real Infinite. The real Infinite
is he who is the support and cause of all that
is finite and is yet beyond all limitations. That
the existence of the finite in the Infinite is a
mystery not quite intetligible, we have already
seen. And we have also seen that to pronounce
the finite to be illusory and to call the creative
power of God by the name of Maya, is not a
solution of the mystery. According to the
Mayavadin, the individuality and finitude of man
is only apparent \' vydvahdrika ) and not real
{pdvamdrthika),— it is only from the standpoint
of ignorance that it seems real ; it is not
real from the standpoint of knowledge, from
which the Infinite and Absolute, without any
II
l62 DUALISM, MONISM AND UNITY-IN-DIFFERENCE CHAP.
difference, is alone real. We have alread}' shown
the error of this view ; but a few more ^vords on
the subject may make it somewhat clearer. The
Mayavadin says the idea of individuality (jiva-
bhdva) is due to ignorance. Now, we ask— whose
ignorance? There can be no ignorance in the
Absolute, who is all knowledge. But ignorance
surely exists; therefore, the finite individual, the
subject of ignorance, exists too. That ignorance
is iiegative, privative, admits of no doubt. But
as; its existence as a want, as an imperfection, is
doubtless, and as there can be no. ^ivant or imper-
fection in the Infinite arid Perfect Being, there
can be no doubt of the existence — existence in
relation indeed to the Perfect — of the individual
as the subject of ignorance, of imperfection.
Therefore, though unable to explain the mystery
of creation, to explain clearly how- the finite
exists in the Infinite in unity and difference, we
arrive at this undoubted conclusion that the
existence of the individual is not merely apparent,
not due to ignorance, but is real. The individual
is real, not merely phenomenally real, but truly
real, — real in relation to the Absolute. As
ignorance, as a privation, a negation, confirms
this inference, so love and holiness, as perfections,
as positive virtues^ confirm the same inference.
Uh . ., ,;.;;TH;z;.. WITNESS OF LOVE 163
Love and holiness imply relation and thus differ-
ence. One person loves another, and is just to
another. As there are love and holiness in the
world, it is not absolutely monistic, — there must
necessarily exist; differences in it. Those who
acknowledge ■ the. reality of love and holiness,
must- see in them irrefutable proofs of the doctrine
of unjty-in-difference. They v^all see that in all
tlie loving relations of father and son, husband and
vv^ife ■ &c., unity and difference are both implied.
Similarly, in truth, justice, obedience, and such
other .ethical relations, they will see the same
unitj'-in-difference. The Monist may attribute
these relations to ignorance, but he will find
ignorance itself inexplicable by his theory. That
ignorance is a sure proof of difference, we have
already^ seen. -The real ultimate truth therefore
is neither Dualism nor Monism, but Unity-in-
difference.
We have nov,- to see tliat the spiritual dangers
seen in Monism are not to be found in the
doctrine taught by us. The finite self, feeling
its own want of wisdom, love and holiness, anj:!
knowing the all-knowing, all-loving and. all-
holy Supreme Self to be present within it as its life
and support,, will ever worship him with love,
prav toi-.him for wisdom, love and holiness
164 DUALISM, MONISM AND UNITY-IN-DIFFERENCE CHAP,
and strive after deeper and deeper spiritual union
with him day by day. There are two condi-
tions of worship and spiritual life. The first of
them is that the object of worship must be in
the inmost heart of the worshipper, that there
must be an inseparable connection between
the two, — that the worshipper must be entirely
dependent on the object of worship. The second
condition is that there must be a clear difference
between the worshipper and the object of
worship, — that the latter must be infinitely
greater than the former. Current Dualism is
opposed to the first of these conditions. When
the worshipper says to the object of worship,
"Thou art my life, my inmost self, I cannot live
a moment without thee, I am nothing apart from
thee," current Dualism opposes this deep flow of
devotion and says, "Why so ? I am indeed made
by God, but I am independent of him, apart
from him. To say that man cannot live a
moment without God is to deny man's freedom."
Similarly, whenever any high truth implying
the inseparable relation of God and man is
uttered, whenever man's love, holiness and power
are explained as reflections of God's love, holi-
ness and power, current Dualism smells Monism
in such explanations, protests against them
Ill CONDITIONS OF TRUE WORSHIP 165
and thus keeps aloof from higher faith and
spiritual exercises. On the other hand, current
Monism is against the second condition. When-
ever the worshipper, feeling his own littleness
and the greatness of the object of his worship,
approaches at the feet of the latter, reverently
praises his infinite perfections, and bowing down
in humility says, " I am the eye and thou the
light, I am unloving, but thou art loving, I am
sinful, but thou art holy, save me from my blind-
ness and from my sins, and make me one of thy
humblest servants," current Monism, unable, on
account of its blindness to the difference between
the finite and the Infinite, to solve the mystery of
this sweet Dualism, sees only ignorance and senti-
m.entalism in it. It says, "All is Brahman, — who
worships whom?" It is only the Idealism that
sees both the elements of unity and difference
in knowledge which constitutes the true basis
of deep spiritual life. It sees the object of wor-
ship in the worshipper and the worshipper in
the object of worship ; the teacher in the disciple
and the disciple in the teacher ; the devotee in
the Lord and the Lord in the devotee. The
object of worship, the Lord with infinite perfec-
tions, is himself the life of the worshipper. Faith,
love, humility, ardour, — all the constituents of
l66 DUALISM, MONISM AKD UKITY-IN-OIFFEREN'CE CHAP.
worsbip-^are infused by him into the heart of
the worshipper, who cannot advance a step in
the path of v/orship without his inspiration. It
is therefore evident that he who is worshipped
is the main cause of worship and that his activity
is its necessary condition. But on the other hand,
true worship is not possible without difference.
Worship arises from the union and relation of
the perfect and the imperfect ; though, therefore, ^
the worshipper lives in the vvorshipped, and- is
inspired by him, the one is distinct from the
other. The aspirations and activity of the wor-
shipper, though derived from and sustained by
the worshipped, are yet different from and in
this sense independent of him. In the act of
worship, unity and difference are wonderfully
blended. Neither pure Dualism nor pure Monism
can afford a true basis of worship. The doctrine
of unity-in-difference alone affords a rational basis
of worship. Looked at either as theories or
as systems of spiritual culture, Dualism and
Monism are both only one-sided and not absolute
truths. The absolute truth is their harmony
in the doctrine of unity-in-difference. True
religion is like the shield of Avantinagar in
Ill
/
CONDITIONS OF TRUE WORSHIP 167
the story : one side of it is monistic and the other
dualistic*
T0315?31Mf 3
* The story refefi-ed' to' 'is as follows: A'shieidV'bf
which one side was made of gold and the other of silver,
hung from the palace-gate of the ancient city of Avanti-
nagar. Two horsemen approaching it from opposite direc-
tions admired, one its golden, the other its silvery, brilliance,
utterly ignorant of its dual character. Having differed,
they came to high words, and ultimately to blows. They
wete separated and reconciled by a third person who
showed them both sides of the shield.
CHAPTER IV
THE PERFECT AND THE IMPERFECT
Section i — The Divine Love and Holiness
We have now finished the exposition, so far
as our limited powers allowed, and so far as
was possible in the scope of this little book, of
what are called in the language of Western
Theology the metaphysical attributes of God.
We have seen that he is the true — the cause
and support of all things ; that he is intelligence,
all-knowing, the ruler and searcher of all hearts ;
that he is infinite, — the support of all space and
time ; and that he is one, without a second, and
yet with an element of necessary difference in
him. We shall now say something on the moral
attributes of God, that is, on his perfect love
and holiness. But our discussion of these attri-
butes will not be as long as we could wish it
to be. For, a full discussion of the subject pre-
supposes one on the foundation of morals. But
IV THE SAME METHOD HERE AS ELSEWHERE l6g
discussion on the foundation of morals forms
no part of the scheme of this little book.* With-
out entering into such a discussion, and having
regard to the limited scope of this book, we
proceed to a brief treatment of the subject. To
those who, notwithstanding differences as to the
way in which we arrive at ethical truths, hold
the common view that morality is a real thing,
that duty is not a mere pursuit of pleasure, but
something higher, that the distinction of right
and wrong is a real distinction,— to them, we
hope, our treatment of the subject will give
some satisfaction. The method we have adopted
in our previous chapters in coming to truths
about the nature of God, will be adopted in this
chapter also. Whether we deal with the meta-
physical or the moral attributes of God, the
light of self-knowledge is the brightest
manifestation of the light of God. As we obtain
the clearest evidence of God as the true, the
intelligent and the infinite, in our soul, so in the
soul is to be found the clearest evidence of his
perfect goodness and holiness. Those theologians
who, instead of looking within, seek for evidences
of the Divine goodness and holiness in the
* On this subject see the author's Philosophy of Brdh-
moism, Lecture vii : Conscience and the Moral Law.
170 THE DIVINE LOVE AN'D HOLIKESS CHAP.
events of the external world, are only shallow
thinkers, and their efforts necessarily come to
nought. It is impossible to prove the perfect
love and holiness of God exclusively from
such data. The iriference on the Divine love
and holiness drawn from the happiness
and order- found in the world will surely be
shaken by instances, not rare in the world, of
unhappiness, imperfection and disorder. The
faith in the Divine goodness that remains un-
shaken <^ven in the midst of the greatest trials, is
not based on any external evidence : it is due
to light within. Let us see what this internal
evidence is. Notwithstanding all my unloving
and sinful acts, there is something in me which is
always loving and holy. It is because it always
remains loving and holy that 1 characterise my
and other people's unloving and holy acts as such.
It is the judge of all that is loving and unloving,
all that is holy and unholy. It is this Which calls
men loving or unloving, holy or unholy, and
it is this which compels us to believe in an all-lov-
ing and all-holy Person. This faith is inherent
in the nature of the self, because its own nature
consists of unalloyed love and holiness. In fact
it is the direct manifestation of the Perfect Being.
It is this which is called' " conscience " or " the
IV THE HIGHER SELF IN MAN I7I
voice of God." This all-loving and all-holy
Consciousness exists in every man as his Higher
Self. Ethical truths such as "Truth is to be
followed and untruth to be avoided," "Truth is
beautiful and great and untruth ugly and mean" ;
" Justice is to be followed and injustice avoided,"
" Love is heavenly and hate hellish, — there is
an impassable difference between love and hate,"
"Unselfishness is infinitely superior to selfishness;
there is an infinite gulf between holy thoughts,
holy looks, holy words and holy acts on the one
hand and unholy thoughts, unholy looks, unholy
words and unholy acts on the other" — truths
like these, we say, are revealed to us as essential
features in the character of our Higher Self.
They do not appear to us as mere abstract
principles. The Eternal Consciousness lying at
the basis of our life manifests himself as the
living embodiment of these principles and makes
us understand clearly that he is infinitely superior
to our lower self, subject to animal passions
and impulses, and makes us feel without a doubt
that the lower self is to be sacrificed to him, as he
alone is our rightful king, -When principles like
the above are revealed to us and conquers, if only
for a moment, our lower self, when our thoughts,
feelings and desires become perfectly holy, when
172 THE DIVINE LOVE AND HOLINESS CHAP.
not a tinge of unlovingness and unholiness re-
mains in our hearts, when the soul is full of the
sweet perfume of holiness, and the heart, full of
love, embraces the whole world, when love and
holiness are to us things no more outward, but
wholly inward, the breath, the very flesh and
blood, of our soul, — in such rare moments, the
direct object of our knowledge is not merely an
abstract ideal, but a perfectly loving and holy
Person. Charmed with the transcendent beauty
of this Supreme Person, the worshipper exclaims, —
" Who art thou, standing in the garden
of my heart ?
Many beautiful forms have I seen, but not such
a form as this."*
At such a moment, the distinction of the finite
and the Infinite is not indeed obliterated ; the
metaphysical perfections of God do not indeed
come down to man and make him omniscient
and omnipotent ; neither are those innumerable
kind and holy acts revealed to us which proceed
out of the infinite power and wisdom of God ;
but the main features of his moral perfection are
really revealed to us. It may be said that at
such times we are aware only of a particular
* Brahmasangit : Hymn No. 493 in the 9th edition
published by the Sadharan Brahmo Samaj.
IV WITNESS OF CONSCIENCE 1 73
State of our soul. But in fact, as there is no such
thing as " a mere sensation " or " a mere idea,"
but the total concrete reality is a self with a
sensation or an idea, so there is no such thing as
a mere state, a mere state of perfect love and
holiness. What we know at such moments is
not a mere state, but a living Self — a Person of
perfect love and holiness. It is true that we are
not always conscious of the presence of this
perfect Person, — that we are often deprived of
his light and are consequently led to delusion
and sin by the promptings of low desires. But
this does not affect in the least the perfect love
and holiness of God. As the image of nature,
even when absent from our knowledge, exists
for ever in the Eternal Consciousness which con-
stitutes our life ; as our self-consciousness, even
when disappearing in deep sleep, remains
intact in the eternal, ever-waking Consciousness,
so, perfect love and holiness, when disap-
pearing from our individual heart and will after
their momentary manifestation to us, exists
permanently in the eternal Person who is our life,
and revealing themselves to us at times, judges
every thought, feeling, look, word and act that
proceed from us and thus leads us on and on in
the path of love and holiness.
174 THE DIVIKE LOVE AND HOLINESS CHAP.
Wherever there is moral struggle, in what-
ever soul the seed of ethical life has germinated,
be it in the smallest degree, there is manifested
this higher self, more or less. Not that every one
can recognise this higher self as the direct
manifestation of the Perfect Being. As many
cannot recognise the light of the self as the
direct manifestation of the Divine light, so there
are many who cannot recognise this light of
conscience as the direct manifestation of the
perfect Light of Holmess. Though revealed as
conscience, he remains unknown to many. But
whether known or unknown, it is his manifesta-
tion that makes ethical life possible. It is from
the mutual opposition of the higher self and
the lower, from the • conflict of conscience
with impulse — that ethical struggle rises. A soul
is not inconceivable — perhaps there may be such a
class of men — in which ethical struggle has not
yet had the smallest beginning,- a man who has
come up to the human stage so far as his body is
concerned, but who is entirely subject to his lower
desires, who remains practically in thestage of
a brute. The absence of conscience in such a
person does not any way make conscience the
less real. It is in the ethical life that conscience
is manifested, and there alone is its light neces-
iV CONSCIENCE OMNIPRESENT 1 75
sary. It exists in all ^Mho belong to the ethical
world, be they virtuous, or yjcious, wise. or foolish,
civilised or uncivilised. -In calmer: mQments,
when the eye of conscience is not dimmed by the
excitement of. brutal, passions, at such a time, if
even a most degraded sinner is asked, "Which is
better, love or hate? virtue or vice? If you
get without oppressing others, without com-
mitting sin, all for which you oppress others,
— ^food, clothing, pleasure, fame, honour, power
&£.,-'— will you persist , in, sinning ?" he will say
without hesitation^-'':IvPve ; and virtue indeed are
superior to hate and vice ; if I get w'ithout
oppression, without sin^ ail that I desire, I
shall desist from my sinful life." This natural
respect for and leaning towards love and holiness
exists in every man. It is not indeed equally
deep in all. Its depth varies according to
varia;tionS: in education, civilisation and culture.
But a general ideal of perfect love and holi-
ness exists in all m.ore or less. The more brightly
it exists in a man, the greater is his respon-
sibility and the more strenuous is the struggle of
virtue and vice in him. , ..However, it is this
manifestation of Gocjjj int^ith^t^soul which is the
clearest evidence of his fperfiect love; and holinqssi
He says clearly in the soul, ''1 ajm.i perfectly
176 THE DIVINE LOVE AND HOLINESS CHAP.
loving, perfectly holy." This clear voice of him
in the soul makes us sure of his nature. Not
that we never doubt this voice ; we do some-
times have doubts. But such a doubt is suicidal,
it kills itself. We proceed to show how it
does so.
Certain seemingly harmful and seemingly
unjust actions in the world make us sometimes
doubt the perfect love and holiness of God.
What we perceive are mere actions ; we have
no direct knowledge of their moral quality, —
whether they proceed from love or hate, virtue
or vice. And it is impossible to have such know-
ledge. W^e are directly aware only of our own
motives ; the motives of other minds cannot
be direct objects of our knowledge. But as
actions similar to the natural actions referred to
are often seen to proceed from hate and wicked-
ness when done by man, we are led to think,
on a superficial view, that God, the doer of these
actions in nature, is unloving and unjust. But
if, when such doubts occur to us, we look at
the light of God within, we at once see their
absurdity. It is only God's actions, not his
feelings and desires, that appear in nature. The
latter are manifest only in our souls. In the soul
he manifests himself as the embodiment of per-
IV DOUBT OF DIVINE PERFECTION ABSURD 177
feet love and holiness. Here his moral perfection
is an object, not of inference, but of direct
perception. Therefore, the doubt that he is
unloving and unholy in the world, is vitiated by
the contradiction that God is perfectly loving
and not perfectly loving, perfectly holy and not
perfectly holy. So it is evidently suicidal. With-
out, we see only a number of his actions, we
do not see his feelings and desires. But within,
he manifests himself as perfectly loving and per-
fectly holy. Therefore, though the actions are
enigmatical, — their exact purpose unintelligible —
there can be no doubt that they do not proceed
from any absence of love or holiness.
But suppose that what we have interpreted
as the direct manifestation of God in the soul
is not accepted as such and is explained only
as his action, and the love and holiness in man's
heart is represented only as his own ideal of per-
fection. Now, even if such an interpretation of
the facts be accepted — an interpretation which
we consider as inadequate — the doubt referred
to, the doubt of God's perfect love and holiness,
may be shown to be absurd. Such a doubt really
suggests that God has created a being, that is
man, who is higher than himself, — has given to
his creature what is not in himself. It really says
12
178 THE DIVINE LOVE AND HOLINESS CHAP.
that not only are such saints and philanthropists
as Buddha and Jesus higher than God,
but even worms like ourselves sometimes
rise higher than he, for we too sometimes feel
inclined to embrace the whole world, we too
are sometimes charmed with the beauty of holi-
ness, and when we do so, we are really filled with
pure love and holiness. And this doubt also
says that God, though partly unloving and un-
holy, has made man so that he loves perfect
love and holiness and hates hatred and unholi-
ness ; in other words, the Father has made
the soil so that the more he grows up the more
will he hate and abuse the Father and the more
will he incline towards that (that is, perfect
love and holiness) which the Father does not
like, and at last fully rebelling against him,
strive after the establishment of that kingdom of
love and righteousness which he is supposed to
hate. What an idea ! It makes the Divine Father
a greater fool than the most foolish of human
fathers, for even a human father never teaches
his son to hate and rebel against him.
It will thus be seen how very groundless are
the doubts about God's perfect love and holiness,
and how shallow and superficial are those writers
who fill their books with such worthless
iV CONFIRMATION 1-ROM THE ORDER OF NATURE 179
doubts and are admired as deep philosophers
by their thoughtless readers. The sceptic sits
in judgment over God because he cannot explain
certain enigmatical events in nature. He does
not see that the ideal of love and holiness in his
soul which leads him to judge God, is revealed
by God himself. The love and holiness on which
he takes his stand in criticising God, in setting
him down as unloving and unjust, are the
clearest proofs of the Divine love and holiness
and the strongest refutation of his erroneous
conclusion, for they prove that it is not want
of love and holiness, but something else, from
which such actions proceed.
This argument from conscience is the main
proof of God's perfect love and holiness.* The
order and innumerable beneficent adaptations
in nature confirm this proof in a thousand ways.
With the help of these adaptations man is continu-
ally advancing towards greater and greater com-
fort and happiness and rising higher and higher
in the scale of moral excellence. We are not
going to describe these beneficent designs in
detail. They fill man's inner and outer life,
* On this subject, see Dr. James Martineau's Study of
Religion, Bk. II, Chap. II, and Green's Prolegomena to
Ethics, Bk. Ill, Chap. II.
i8o god's love to individuals chap.
— the home, the village, the town, the field, the
river, the hill and the ocean. All sciences loudly
proclaim the beneficence of nature. In the world,
the good is the rule, — it is the good that is
progressive. Painful and enigmatical events are
transient and vanishing. With such events we
shall deal in some detail at the end of the
present chapter.
Section 2 — God's Love to Individuals
God's love to man seems at first sight to be
only general. It seems, on a superficial view,
that he takes care of man only in a general way
and that every man individually is not the
object of his love. But on a somewhat closer
view a speciality is found underlying this
generality. When we contemplate somewhat
deeply the love of God, it is found that as he
exists as the life of every soul, as the Inner
Ruler and Searcher of every heart, so he is the
Father, Mother, Friend, Teacher, Guide, Saviour,
and Lord of every person. Every human heart has
a deep and sweet relation with him, and this
relation is becoming gradually deeper and sweeter.
We insert here a portion of a sermon preached
by the present writer in the Mandir of the
Sadharan Brahmo Samaj on the love of God to
IV GOD S DIRECT DEALINGS WITH EVERY MAN lOI
individuals. The first few words of this extract
have been said once or twice before in this book,
but a repetition of them here will not perhaps be
unpleasant.
"When we look at the relation of God and
man in the light of self-consciousness, this truth
becomes very clear, and our faith in it becomes
gradually brighter. It is needless to say that
in order to understand this relation, deep thought
and meditation are necessary. To those who
neglect this knowledge as only dry philosophical
doctrine, and not seeing its necessary relation
to higher spiritual life, are indifferent to its
culture, the higher truths about the love of God
and his constant activity always remain dim
and covered with doubts and appear like dreams.
But when the deep and constant relation of God
with the soul is realised by deep meditation, the
truth of his incomparable love grows bright.
What does self-consciousness show us ? It shows
that my life rests in God in all conditions, — in
waking, oblivion, dream and sleep. In no state
of my life, not for a single moment, am I under
any blind force. At all times, in all states, I
live in him. And I have no power which is not
derived from him, which does not rest in him.
This imajre of the congregation before me is
l82
GOD S LOVE TO INDIVIDUALS CHAP,
painted by God himself on my mind, — this per-
ception is entirely a spiritual phenomenon. It is
not the body that sees, and a material object
cannot make one see. It is the soul that sees,
and it is the soul that shows ; seeing is a state of
the soul. Thus it is seen that, seeing, hearing,
smelling, tasting and touching are all spiritual
phenomena, — the contact of soul with soul. And
it is only he who is within the soul, in whose
hand the soul is, to whom the soul is as a play-
thing, that can produce these phenomena. Again,
when we look at our life from another side,
when we see that we are extremely forgetful,
but at the same time memory is ever active
in us, that though we are forgetful, our life goes
on quite smoothly without any difficulty, we are
surprised to see the deep relation of God with
the soul. This very moment, when we are think-
ing of God in this Mandir, how many things of
our life we have forgotten ! Now we have lost,
so to say, the whole of our past life. But as we
are speaking, things lost or forgotten are coming
back to the mind. When we re-enter the world,,
everything will occur to the mind again in time.
Thus we are forgetting things every now and
then and remembering them again. Where do
the events of our past life go when we forget
IV WITNESS OF MEMORY AND RE-WAKING 183
them, and where do they come from again ? And
who brings them back ? When we think of these
things, we feel extremely surprised. How near
my soul is he, — how closely related is my soul
to that all-seeing and ever-waking Spirit who
holds these things in him and returns them to
me ! The soul is really a plaything to him.
Again, when we sleep and become unconscious,
utterly inert and inactive, and lose knowledge,
memory, understanding, power, everything, in
whom does the soul then live ? In that helpless
state, who preserves the lost things of life ? And
who wakes us in time and gives us back the
lost contents of life ? Not awaking would be
quite possible ; why then do we awake ? And
who wakes us ? And even when awakened, we
might not get back those things. In that case
our life would be reduced to the state of an
infant. Who carefully gives them back and
resumes the solemn play of life ? It is he, — that
sleepless, ever-waking Person, — who is the con-
stant support of the soul, and of whom the soul
is a plaything. Thus we see that every soul is
deeply and directly related to the Supreme Being.
Whatever elements are required for the sustenance
and advancement of our life, he gives directly
to every soul. Knowledge, feeling and power, of
184 god's love to individuals chap.
which our life consists, are not under our own
control. He directly gives these to us and thus
keeps us alive. Every soul, every human life,
is a field of his incessant activity. What we call
the world is an aggregate of such fields.
" When we look at the face of God in the
light of this blessed knowledge revealed in the
soul, we are charmed and struck dumb with
awe. We then see that the general providence
of God is a mere meaningless phrase. To say
that God loves us in a general way, is to ascribe
human imperfection to him. Or if general
providence has any meaning, that meaning is
that the aggregate of special providences or
dispensations may in a sense be called general
providence. It is indeed true that God works
by general laws. But this does not make our
individual relation to him general. He works
by general laws, but the fields of his activity
are particular. He deals specially and ceaselessly
with individual souls. From morning to evening,
and from evening to another morning, all day
and night his loving activity goes on in our
hearts and in our lives. It is he who wakes all,
calls the heart to utter his name and sing his
praise at the break of day, takes us out to enjoy
the cool morning breeze, bathes us in cool water,
IV THE BESETTING GOD 185
the direct manifestation of his love, and makes
us take our food, the direct embodiment of his
grace. Is it mere poetry to say that he makes
us eat? Is the truth merely this, that I eat?
Certainly not. I could not see my food unless
he showed it to me as the eye of my eyes. Not
a particle of the food could exist unless he sup-
ported it. And unless he infused strength into
my body moment by moment, my eating and
drinking and all other acts would be impossible.
In what are merely physical or human acts to the
eye of the shallow and the unbelieving, where
the shallow see only the cook or the members
of their families or only a number of material
things, the closely observing believer sees the
living presence of God and is overwhelmed with
feeling. It is thus that God sustains and nurses
us. He himself exists in the body, digests our
food, circulates our blood and performs all
other functions of the body. Present in our field
of work, he infuses strength into our body and
mind and makes us work. Ever related to the
body and the mind, he accompanies us wherever
we go and saves us from the innumerable
dangers that beset our daily life. It is he
who gives us rest and peace when our labours
are at an end. It is he who, when we study,
iS6
GOD S LOVE TO INDIVIDUALS CHAP.
makes us see as the eye of our eyes, and imparts
to us the light of knowledge through our reason
and understanding. It is he who calls us to
worship, makes us join our hands and close our
eyes, composes our thoughts, reveals himself to
the soul as truth, love and holiness, refreshes
our heart with love and peace, and braces
the soul with the strength of holiness. It is he
who, as our conscience, gives commandments to
the soul, saves it from sin, leads it to virtuous
acts, and holding before it higher and higher
ideals of spiritual life, allures it to heaven.
It is he who leads us to the virtuous and the
pious, makes us hear their sweet words as the
ear of our ears, enables our mind to understand
them, and impresses them on our hearts. Bridg-
ing over great distances of time and space,
he leads us to the assembly of the ancient
Aryan sages and makes us listen to their deep
teachings, shows us the figure of the Buddha
in profound meditation under the Bodhi-tree,
makes us hear the blessed words of Jesus seated
on the mountains of Canaan, leads us to Calvary
and shows us that touching and wonderful scene
of self-sacrifice, and taking us to old Nadia,
makes us dance in the excitement of love with
the love-maddened devotees assembled there.
IV THE DIVIN'E LOVE OVERWHELMING 187
Thus taking us into the company of innumerable
devotees, thinkers and workers, old and new,
he shows the soul the beauties of heaven and
leads it to salvation. If I multiply my activity
for myself millions of times, it will not equal
his activity for me. Where then is that
generality of providence that we hear of?
Everything about it is special. The whole of
my life, I see, is a field of his special providence.
I lie steeped in the ocean of his special love.
Whatever I see, hear, gain, enjoy or suffer,—
all are waves of this ocean of special love.
The sun, the moon, water, air, the earth, 1113'
house, my family, my friends, society, good books,
good men, knowledge, love, peace, holiness,
all are waves of that love. I lie floating on that
ocean ; his love is endless, boundless, unspeakable.
It is because I cannot realise his love fully that
I am able to live ; a full realisation would be
too much for the feelings and unbearable to the
heart. When I realise it a little, when I see
how wicked I am, how base and ungrateful, how
very indifferent to him, and how very busy with
the worthless things of the world, while on the
other hand, he is heaping mercies on my head,
and plunging me in an ocean of love which
cannot be paid back, my heart swells up,
THE MYSTERY OF EVIL
and seems bursting. Then I sing quite heart-
ily-
'The weight of thy love
I can bear no more ;
My heart cries out and bursts
when I see thy love ;
I take refuge in thy fearless feet'*
"When shall I know his love, feel it deeply,
be loving, and never know dryness ! When will
it be that, —
'Maddened by love I shall laugh and cry,
Shall float in the ocean of divine bliss,
Shall madden others with my madness.
And shall disport for ever under the
feet of God! 't
May the Merciful soon bring such a happy
day !"
Section 3 — The Mystery of Evil
We have set forth to the best of our power
the proof of God's perfect love and holiness.
It is now time for us to speak of certain enig-
matical events in nature which seem to conflict
with the divine perfection. The subject is a very
* Hymn. No. 322 in Brahniasangit : Ninth Edition,
pubhshed by the Sadharan Brahmo Samaj.
t Hymn No. 703 in the same collection.
THE REAL FOUN'DATIOK OF FAITH lOg
difficult one, and for its very difficulty demands
a lengthy discussion. But it does not fall with-
in the scope of this book to discuss the subject
fully.* We shall say only a few words briefly
on the subject.
The first remark that we have to make is
that for establishing our faith on a firm ground
a discussion of such events is not absolutely
necessary. The real foundation of faith is internal
evidence. So long as man does not clearly see
the nature of this evidence, he remains busy
with the discussion of external events. Not that
when this evidence becomes clear such a dis-
cussion becomes quite unnecessary ; but in that
case, faith, resignation, hope and peace no more
depend on such discussions. Where the intellect
fails to understand, the soul rests on the bright
light of reason within and hopes that with the pro-
gress of knowledge the unintelligible will become
intelligible. A few years of friendship and mu-
tual respect make us trust a human friend so
much, that even when we see him doing a
number of enigmatical and seemingly wrong
actions, we do not at once set them down as
* See Dr. Martineau's excellent treatment of this
subject in his Study of Religion Bk. II, Chap. III. See
also Hedge's Reason in Religion : "The Old Enigma."
igO THE MYSTERY OF EVIL CHAP.
such, but believe that in time we shall see the
reasonableness of such actions. We naturally
accuse a man of extreme suspiciousness and
meanness of heart in whom we do not see such
trust. If such confidence is reasonable in regard
to a puny and imperfect human friend, how
much more reasonable it is in regard to our
greatest Friend, the Supreme Being. It is impossible
that with the particle of knowledge given to
us we should penetrate into the meaning of all
the acts of the Infinite. Therefore, even if we fail
to give a reasonable explanation of the seeming
€vils of the world, our intuitive faith in God's
goodness remains unshaken.
Our second remark on the subject is that the
explanation which some sceptics offer of the
enigma is quite unacceptable. They think that
the evils of the world are due to the fact that
God has not been able to bring entirely under
his control the original uncreated matter which
forms the substance of the world. We have
shown in the proper place that what we call
matter is entirely dependent on mind, so that
there is no meaning in God's bringing it under
his control. We have also shown that it is only
consciousness that can have efficiency, — that
efficiency and consciousness are inseparable, so
SEEMING EVILS igi
that an unconscious object opposing God is also
meaningless. Thirdly, we have also shown that
there can be no power in the universe except an
infinite and indivisible Mind, and that all finite
powers are reproductions of this infinite Power.
Our third remark is that many events in
nature which seem to be evils are only blessings
in disguise. With the progress of human know-
ledge many events and things that formerly
seemed to be harmful have been proved to be
beneficial. The effect of storms and fires in
purifying the air, the beneficence of famines and
epidemics in checking over-population and pro-
moting sympathy and benevolence, the various
usefulness of many poisonous animals and plants,
and the wonderful power for good possessed by
the apparently dreadful lightning, are no longer
unknown to any one. That the troubles and
trials of life chasten and soften the heart, bring
experience and foresight to the understanding
and strength to the will, is known to every
thoughtful person. If we had space enough,
we might have dwelt long on the subject. It is
to be hoped that with the gradual advancement
of human knowledge the real nature of many
other things now seeming to be evils will be
revealed.
ig2 THE MYSTERY OF EVIL CHAP.
Our fourth remark is that the process of
creation is not yet at an end. The world is not a
completed thing ; its creation is still going on
and it has not yet reached perfection. Science
proves that the visible world has, from the state
of a fiery gas, become gradually cool, hard and
suitable for the habitation of living beings, and
that its suitableness is continually increasing.
Natural cataclysms are becoming fewer and
fewer and with the gradual increase of
man's power and knowledge many means have
been discovered for protecting him from such
cataclysms. The world is going on from im-
perfection to perfection. The divine purpose in
regard to the world is not yet fully revealed,
but is being gradually revealed. It is unavoid-
able that in the course of this gradual develop-
ment of the world many imperfections should be
seen in it, — that it should fall short of the ideal
of perfection revealed by God himself in the
human mind. But the Creator cannot be blamed
for this imperfection, for it is continually vanish-
ing. If vanishing imperfection is an evil, there
is indeed evil in the world, but such evil does
not conflict with the goodness of God. Now, it
may be asked, "Why this gradual development ?
What means this slow process of improvement ?
IV CREATION MUST BR A PROCESS IQJ
Why did not God make the world perfect from
the beginning?" Of course none but God himself
can give a satisfactory answer to these questions.
What little we understand of the matter we may
put briefly as follows: (i) The only idea we
have of a thing subject to time is that it should
grow gradually. Time implies a process, in
this case a process of growth. (2) Even if it
were possible for the universe to come out perfect
from the Creator's hand, it would not be desir-
able. In that case man would understand
nothing of its nature. Science depends on the
study of process — of a process of growth. There
would have been no science without a process of
growth, and so an important characteristic of
human nature would have been impossible.
(3) Not only science, but other characteristics of
humanity would perhaps have been impossible in
that case. It is because the world is a process of
growth that man is active. There are wants
in nature, and to remove them man has to
struggle against them, and in this struggle he
is coming into constant relations of sympathy,
co-operation and competition with fellow-men.
In this consists the manhood of man. If the
world were a perfect object without process
and development, these relations and the man-
13
194 THE MYSTERY OF EVIL CHAP.
hood they make possible would have been
impossible.
Fifthly, what has been said of the world's
imperfection and the process of growth through
which it is passing, applies more clearly to man's
individual and social life. God is one, infinite
and perfect. He cannot make another infinite
and perfect being. There cannot be more than
one infinite and perfect being. God's infinitude
and perfection cannot be communicated to any
other being. This does not imply any absence
of power in God. That the impossible cannot
be done, does not bespeak any want of power.
As it does not imply any want of power in God
that he cannot make two and two five, so it
implies no want of power in him that he cannot
make man, whose life is subject to time, perfect.
A created object must necessarily be finite and
imperfect. Something which begins to be, must
be such that it can make continual progress, but
can never be perfect. Imperfection must be
inherent in it, and this inherent imperfection
must be unavoidable to it. Whatever progress
it makes towards perfection, some imperfection
must always stick to it. Infinite power, know-
ledge, love, peace and holiness can belong to
God alone. Created beings must be limited in
IV A CREATED BEIXG MUST BE LIMITED 195
these attributes. The creatures of a perfectly
good God must indeed be progressive, but a
creature must necessarily be imperfect. This
imperfection may in a sense be called an evil,
but this evil, that is, the want of perfect good,
is unavoidable for created beings. For them
there is no meaning in a good free from this
€vil. The very idea of a created being is this, —
he can expect from an omnipotent and perfectly
good Creator only this — that he should make
gradual progress from evil towards good, that is
from imperfection towards perfection. Such
progress is his only good. And man and his
condition exactly correspond to this idea. Under
the providence of God he is making continual
progress towards power, knowledge, civilisation,
happiness, love and peace. Whatever evils we
see in his life are but forms of his inherent im-
perfection as a created being. Imperfection in
knowledge and power is itself an evil in one
sense, though this evil does not conflict with
the divine goodness. And then a certain amount
of pain as the result of this imperfection is also
unavoidable. The ultimate explanation of evil
is this imperfection inherent in created nature.
In seeking an explanation of many particular
painful events we see behind them this inherent
ig6 THE MYSTERY OF EVIL
imperfection of man — his want of knowledge,
power «&c. Where the cause of some painful
event cannot be clearly discovered, we ought
to trust in the light within and believe that
it must be due to some such unavoidable cause.
The conclusion of the whole matter is there-
fore this : — There is really no conflict between
the omnipotence and the perfect love and holiness
of God on the one hand and the imperfection
of created beings and the pain consequent upon
it on the other. Notwithstanding the omnipo-
tence and perfect goodness of God, the imperfec-
tion of created beings and a certain amount of
pain resulting from it are unavoidable. But
this pain is, in most instances, the harbinger of
higher happiness and spiritual progress. And
pain of all forms is transient. With the progress
of man pain is disappearing from the world.
Our intuitive faith in God's perfection is there-
fore untouched by the evil seen in the world.
But inspite of this clear witness of knowledge,
our weak faith is often shaken by the several
trials of life. Nothing but deep communion
with God in worship and the hearty enjoyment
of his love can remedy this weakness of faith.
We have explained almost all the attributes
in which God reveals himself to man and in
IV THE DIVINE BLISSFULNESS 197
which his devotees worship him. These main
attributes have under them innumerable sub-
attributes which perhaps need not be particularly
expounded here. When faith is established in
these fundamental attributes and the soul ad-
vances in religious life in the light of such
faith, these sub-attributes are gradually revealed
to it. One attribute, which may be reckoned
as a fundamental attribute and which devotees
make an object of devout meditation, has received
no particular exposition in this book. It is the
blissfulness (dnanda) of God. The cause of our
not taking it up is that it scarcely admits of
metaphysical exposition and is not an object
of metaphysical doubt.* The blissfulness of God
is more an object of feeling and enjoyment than
of thought and discussion. Discussion enables
us to see only so far that a state of perfect
knowledge, love and holiness is also a state of
perfect bliss. It is imperfection, it is want, that
causes pain, while perfection is the source of
bliss. The Perfect One therefore is perfectly
blissful. But perhaps devotees scarcely contem-
plate God's blissfulness in this light. It is his
* This was written before the appearance of Mr.
F. H. Bradley's Appearance aud Reality, in which the
subject is elaborately dealt with.
ig8 THE MYSTERY OF EVIL CHAP.
manifestation as bliss in moments of deep devo-
tion— 'Ananda-YUpam-amvitam yadvihhdti — * that
is particularly the object of adoration and enjoy-
ment. It is when he reveals himself in deep
communion as the life of our life, that we feel
him as blissful. It is when the heart swells on
seeing the Perfectly Loving, as the ocean swells
through the attraction of the moon, that we
feel him as blissful. It is when the heart, finding
no joy in earthly things, thirsts after seeing the
Unseen in his matchless beauty and is
charmed by the merest glimpse of that beauty,
that we feel him as blissful. Blessed is the Blissful
(Anandarupam), the Nectarful {Amritarupam),
May his bliss, his nectar, fill the whole world !
* The Mundaka Upanishad, 11
Supplementary ghapters
CHAPTER A
THEISTIC PRESUPPOSITIONS OF SCIENCE*
We have seen in our fourth lecture how mind
and nature, in their relation as subject and
object, reveal a conscious unity which at once
constitutes this relation and transcends the limi-
tation implied in it, and how our knowledge
of time and space also involves the knowledge
of an infinite and eternal Consciousness in re-
lation to which all things in time and space
exist, and which is also the inmost self of all
intelligent beings. The method we employed
in arriving at these truths is called the metaphysi-
cal— the method of a science which claims to
be the science of all sciences, for it deals with
the fundamental principles of all special sciences
— the principles underlying all knowledge and
* Lecture V of the author's Philosophy of Brdhmaism.
200 THEISTIC PRESUPPOSITIONS OF SCIENCE CHAP.
reality. As we saw in the last lecture, in all
acts of knowing, the concrete reality known is a
subject-object — an indivisible consciousness with
objects necessarily related to it. In no act of
knowing, as we saw, do we know a mere object
unrelated to a subject or a mere subject unrelated
to an object, a finite subject unrelated to the
Infinite or a bare, colourless Infinite without any
relation to things finite. Now, it is this essential
relation of the object to the subject and the
finite to the Infinite which it is the special pro-
vince of Metaphysics to show forth and on a
practical recognition of which all religion, truly
so called, is based. But it will be seen that all
special sciences, sciences dealing with particular
things or particular aspects of things, are, — in
so far as they retain their speciality, in so far as
they avoid dealing with the general principles
of all sciences and do not intrude upon the
subject-matter of other sciences, — based on an
abstraction of this fundamental relation. They
speak of objects as if they were realities independ-
ent of a subject, and of finite intelligences as if
they were distinct realities unconnected with one
another and independent of the Supreme Intelli-
gence or God. This abstraction is indeed
necessary for the existence and elaboration of the
A SPECIAL SCIENCES BASED ON ABSTRACTION 20I
Special sciences. Their function of finding out
the qualities and relations of special things
would not be helped, but would rather be ham-
pered, by constant references to metaphysical
truths — to their relation to the Supreme Reality
of whi:h they are parts or manifestations. But
what is unfortunate is, that not only the un-
reflective and unscientific mass, but many men of
science also are not aware that the special sciences
proceed upon an abstraction, and that really
there is only one absolute science, the science
of the Supreme Reality or God, and all special
sciences are only ramifications of that one
absolute science, — all dealing with relative truths
— truths that rise into absoluteness only when
they are looked at in the light of the one Abso-
lute Truth. Most scientific men mistake the
abstraction of objects from the mind and of the
finite from the Infinite as a real separation, and
do not feel the need of rounding off the special
sciences by showing their necessary relation to
Metaphysics or Absolute Science. They do not
see that the knowledge imparted by the special
sciences does not amount to real or absolute
knowledge unless it is seen in relation to the
knowledge of the one Absolute Reality that
shines through all. Now, this attitude of scienti-
202 TIIEISTIC PRESUPPOSITIOXS OF SCIENXE CHAP.
fic men is, in these days, doing the greatest
harm to religion. The world is happily growing
more and more scientific day after day. Scientific
methods, the methods of observation and generali-
sation, are being applied to all departments of
nature and society. Blind dependence on author-
ity is giving way to free and unbiased thought
in all concerns of life. Religion, which was
the last human concern to rest upon authority ,^
is itself tending to become a science, and has
already become so to some choice minds. But
to the great majority of reflective men it is not
yet a science, and such men seem to swing
between two extremes. One portion seems still
to be trying to feel after a foundation of faith
independent of science, while the other has run
to the opposite dogmatism of supposing the
special sciences as sources of absolute knowledge
and of rejecting as superstition everything that
does not come within their sphere. People of
this class naturalh' look upon the truths of
religion as no truths at all, and can be won back
over to religion only if they can be shown that
the principles that guide scientific thought,,
commonly so-called, are not fundamental prin-
ciples leading to true or absolute knowledge, —
that they need to be re-criticised and seen in
A METAPHYSICAL CONCEPTIONS IN SCIENCE 203.
relation to principles that are really fundamental,
and that when this is done, it is seen that the
sciences, instead of being opposed or indifferent
to religion, instead of being sceptical or agnostic
as regards religious truths, are really so many
revelations of God. This will be clear if we
examine the basal conceptions of the various
sciences, — the fundamental principles which they
take for granted in their investigations of the
phenomena of nature and mind. Such an ex-
amination will show that these conceptions are
really metaphysical and are direct attestations or
expressions of the truths of religion. Now, our
proposed survey of the fundamental conceptions
of science must necessarily be a very brief and
hurried one, as it must be limited by the limited
scope of this lecture. But I think it will give
you sufficient food for reflection and afford hints
which, if developed by thought and study, will
convince you that the agnostic or sceptical aspect
of modern science is a false appearance, the
result, not of true scientific insight, but rather
the absence of it on the part of scientific men,
due rather to a circumscribed view^ of the nature
and requirements of science than to a truly
scientific vision of mind and nature.
Now, the sciences so far recognised as such
204 THEISTIC PRESUPPOSITIOXS OF SCIENXE CHAP.
may be divided into three main groups, the
Physical, the Biological and the Moral. In the
first-mentioned group are such sciences as Physics,
Chemistry, Geology and Astronomy ; the second
includes Botany, Physiology, Zoology and the
like ; and the third comprises Psychology, Logic,
Ethics, Sociology, Politics, etc. The fundamental
conceptions employed in the physical group are
those of substance, casuality and reciprocal
action ; those used in the biological are life and
growth ; and those on which the moral sciences
are based are individuality and social unity.
Now I shall show, by a brief examination of
these various conceptions, that they are really
metaphysical and presuppose the fundamental
truths of religion.
Let us begin, then, with the conception of
substance. This idea implies that all changes are
changes of something which remains unchanged
and undiminished, that all changes are changes
in form or appearance, but that what undergoes
or presents the changes remains always identical
with itself. For an example we need not go
far. The book in my hand consists of materials
which have gone through many changes. The
paper it is made of assumed its present shape
after many transformations, and it may still go
A CONXEPTIOX OF SUBSTANCE 205
through many more, I might now, if I were
so minded, put it into the fire of the light before
me, and it would, in the course of a few minutes,
be reduced to ashes. How great would be the
change it would then undergo ! Both its visible
and tangible shape would be changed. But we
should still believe that the substance of which
it is composed would remain quite undiminished
in quantity and identical with itself. Even if we
supposed the matter it consisted of to be so
rarefied as to be invisible and intangible, we
should still believe it to remain undiminished in
quantity and identical in its essential qualities.
Now, what is that persistent element in it which
under so many changes of form and appearance
we believe to be identical with itself? It is plain
that it is nothing sensuous, — no presentation or
appearance to sense, for we suppose all its
sensuous appearances as changeable. It is true
that, under all its changes of form, we still
ascribe to it the essential quality of occupying
space and the power of offering resistance ; but
as we cannot conceive space except as filled with
visible or tangible materials, and as the power
of offering resistance is nothing like the sensible
state or feeling we call resistance, the essential
properties we ascribe to material substance are
2o6 THEISTIC PRESUPPOSITIONS OF SC1E^•CE CHAP.
not actually sensuous qualities. We conceive
it as a mere capability of presenting sensuous
appearances under certain conditions, and not
as actually possessing sensuous qualities. In
using the conception of substance, therefore,
science goes beyond sense and beyond its proper
method of observation and generalisation. No
sensuous experience and no amount of observa-
tion, however vast and searching, can give us
the idea of substance ; and yet no experience and
no observation is possible without it. It is a
pure, non-sensuous conception brought by the
mind itself to experience as one of its essential
constituents. It is in fact a fundamental principle
of thought, an essential form of the mind's own
activity, and necessarily implies the existence of
a knowing permanent Self. It is really the form
in which the Self presents change to itself. The
unchanged or unchangeable is the necessary
correlate of change. An object cannot be con-
ceived as changed and at the same time remain-
ing identical with itself without something in it
being thought of as unchanged. But form as
changing and substance as remaining unchanged
again imply an unchangeable Consciousness to
which they are presented in mutual correlation.
All scientific thought therefore involves, as its
A CONXEPTION OF CAUSE 207
necessary implication, the truth of an eternal
Consciousness to which nature is essentially
related. If men of science doubt or profess
ignorance of this truth, they so far fall short of
true scientific insight and prove themselves in-
capable of working out the principles of science
up to their ultimate logical issues.
This will be seen even more clearly if we
examine the conception of causality, the most
important conception employed in scientific in-
vestigations. The causal law is, that every
change is related to something from which it
follows necessarily, that is, given which, it must
follow. Now, it would be going much beyond
my proposed limits to discuss here the various
theories of causation and their bearing on the
problem before us ; but a brief discussion of at
least two of them cannot be avoided in dealing
with the special subject in hand. You will see
that as it is not a thing considered as permanently
in space, but a change, something that takes
place in time, that we are called upon to account
for, the cause we seek must be related to the
effect in time; or in other words it must be
antecedent to the effect and therefore itself a
change. As we have seen in the fourth lecture,
€very change must be thought of as necessarily
208 THEISTIC PRESUPPOSITIONS OF SCIENCE CHAP,
related to another change both before and after
it, and time must be conceived of as an infinite
series of changes without any absolute beginning
and absolute end. That every change must be
thought of as the change of some substance
remaining identical with itself under all changes,
we have already seen. That the mere self-identity
of a substance, though the general condition of
all changes, cannot account for any particular
change, is also clear. The self-identity of water
is the general condition of its three states, liquid,
solid and gaseous, but for this very reason it
cannot account for any one of these states in
particular. Their explanation we must seek in
the action of other substances on water. The
cause ot a change must therefore be another
change or series of changes. The theory that
a true cause must be a power and the meaning
that properly belongs to 'power,' we shall discuss
as we proceed. The current scientific view of
cause is a change from which the effect follows
necessarily. Now, let us see, by an example,
what this necessity is ; and let us ask whence we
derive this idea of necessity. If I set this book
on fire, you will see it going through a number
of transformations. These transformations will
follow one another necessarily. When one has
THE CAUSAL NEXUS 20g
taken place, the second must follow, and
then the third jnust come after the second,
and so on. Can you suppose that when
I have set fire to one corner of this leaf, the fire
may or may not travel further, or that the change
of colour in it, its thinning away and the loose-
ning of its parts and the like may or may not
take place ? You know that these events must
follow. But this must, this necessity, this causal
nexus that binds one event to another indissolubly,
is just what we do not perceive by any of our
senses. What we perceive is only one event
following another. Particular sequences, the
following of particular events by particular other
events, we may observe several times in our life,
and we may arrive at generalisations from such
observation. But generalisations, however wide,
do not amount to or account for necessity. A
sequence, however constant, is not the same as a
binding link between two events. This binding
link is supplied by the Self in us and the Self in
nature. The Self, as the conscious, non-sensuous
and timeless witness of events, binds them
together by the necessity that essentially belongs
to its thought. The determination of event by
event is really their determination by the Cons-
ciousness of which events are manifestations.
2IO THEISTIC PRESUPPOSITIONS OF SCIENCE CHAP.
In spite of their apparent contingency, events,
as manifestations of the one, self-identical Self,
unchangeable in character, are themselves neces-
sary, and present this necessity in their mutual
relations. The necessity that we discover in the
causal relation is really the self-identical un-
changeable character of the Self that manifests
itself in events and in their relations. If the
Self be symbolically represented by S and any
two events, causally related, by a and b, then
the judgment, ' b is determined by a,' may be
said to be really the judgment, 'S6 is determined
by Sa,' or ' S is determined by S.' What, on a
superficial view, appears to be the determination
of one purely sensuous event by another of the
same nature, turns out, on a deeper and closer
view, to be the determination of the Self by the
Self. What scientific men call the uniformity of
nature, and adduce as the reason why the
sequences observed by them as so far constant and
unvaried must be absolutely constant and invari-
able, is really the self-identical and unchangeable
nature of the Self and the necessity by which the
fundamental principles of thought are charac-
terised. Nature, abstracted from thought, cannot
but appear as contingent, and hence the failure
of mere physical science to explain the necessity
THE REAL MEANING OF NECESSITY
found in the laws discovered by it — a necessity
which nevertheless it assumes and which really
constitutes the value of these laws. The progress
of civilisation — the progress made in agriculture,
navigation, hygiene, medicine and other depart-
ments of life — has all proceeded upon our firm
faith in the fixity of the laws of nature ; and
yet, if we interrogate nature herself as a reality
independent of mind, she really cannot tell us
why she should not be to-morrow quite different
from what she has been up to this time. But
when we endeavour to understand her by light
from within, when we look upon her as the
manifestation of Spirit, we find that her funda-
mental laws, which are really the fundamental
laws of thought, cannot but be necessary and
unchangeable. We thus see that the most im-
portant principle of Physical Science, the law of
universal causation, is really the revelation of
an eternal, unchangeable and self-determining
Spirit in nature. Science, we see, is agnostic or
ignorant of God only in its lower or baser mood,
when it does not fully know itself, when it does
not fully understand the fundamental principles
upon which it proceeds. When made to look
fully at its own face as reflected in the mirror
of true Philosophy, it unavoidably becomes
212 THEISTIC PRESUPPOSITIONS OF SCIENCE CHAP.
theistic. Even Physical Science, not to speak of
the higher sciences, when thus made self-cons-
cious, becomes indistinguishable from Theology
or the Science of God.
Now, we shall find a confirmation of what has
just been said in a particular theory of causation
which has been made much of by some Natural
Theologians of England during the last forty
years or so, and which has been used with much
efEect in recent Brahma literature. You will find
this theory expounded with much fulness in
Babu Nagendranath Chatturji's Dharmajijndsdy
pt. I, and in my Roots of Faith. It is expounded
briefly and in a popular form in my little tract
named Chintdkanikd. The theory interprets the
scientific conception of force as really will, and
holds that unconscious or non-conscious force is an
impossibility. I have recently given a brief
statement of the theory, — brief and at the same
time as clear as I could make it — in a little book
named The Religion of Brahman. I think that
statement will serve our purpose as well as any
fresh one that I could give now. I quote from
p. II, Chapter II, of the book: "We have seen
that self-intuition is involved in perceiving,
thinking, feeling and acting. We shall consider
its relation to acting somewhat more fully and
A ORIGINATING POWER OF WILL 213
see what we learn from it about God. It will
be seen, when the relation of our actions to our
minds is thought upon, that our minds are not
only their knowers, but also their originators.
When I attend, for instance, to the book before
me, and keep my attention fixed upon it, I find
that the action owes its origin to me. The same
thing happens when I fanc}' — hold before my
mind's eye — the image, say, of a tree or a house,
change it as I choose, and at last dismiss it from
my thoughts. A similar power is exercised when,
on being oppressed by a train of troublesome
thoughts or a painful image, I draw away my
mind from it and get rid of the pain. When,
from purely internal actions, we come out to
those in which we come into contact with
external objects, we see the same thing, though
with a difference. When I lift up one of my
hands, the movement certainly owes its origin,
at any rate its initiation, to me ; but it is only
my volition or act of willing that comes out
directly from me. For the motion of my hand
to follow my volition, a number of nerves and
muscles on which I seem to have no direct com-
mand must be moved ; for if they are stiffened by
paralysis or some other cause, as they sometimes
are, I see I cannot move my limbs. As, however.
214 THEISTIC PRESUPPOSITIONS OF SCIENCE CHAP.
under ordinary circumstances, I find my hand
following my wishes, I must think that my
volitions are, by some mysterious means, com-
municated to the motor}' nerves and muscles.
So, when I act on objects external to my body,
when, for instance, I push aside the book before
me, the change surely owes its origin to
me ; but my power in the case is exercised
through the medium of my hand and the
apparatus by which it is moved. Now, it should
be seen that, in all such cases, something that
was not, comes to be. The objects moved may
be old ; the images formed in the mind may be
those of existing objects or combinations of such
objects ; but whether combinations or move-
ments, or their mere reproduction and dismissal,
— to whatever terms the changes are reduced —
something new, something original, is found in
the phenomena. Here, then, is a wonderful
power possessed by the human mind, — it is no
less a power than that of creating, — of bringing
existence out of non-existence. This power we
call the will. It is the mind itself in an active
state. It depends, evidently, on two other
powers — those of knowing and desiring. The
object to be moved must be known beforehand.
A change, either on an external object or on the
A ALL CHANGES DUE TO WILL 215
mind itself, must, previously to its being pro-
duced, be thought of and desired. Will there-
fore is necessarily conscious and intending.
An unconscious and unintending will is an
absurdity.
"Now having in us this power of originating
changes, we cannot but think of such a power
behind the changes that we see taking place
around us. We believe our fellow-beings as
possessing the same power ; we endow the lower
animals with it ; and we people what we call
inanimate nature with innumerable powers, and
trace all natural changes to them. We conceive
our bodies, with the complex machinery of
organs that keeps them alive, as the seats of a
Power not our own ; and we can imagine no
department of nature, — neither air, water, fire,
the vegetable world, the sun, moon, nor stars —
as without some guiding power or other. Now,
it is seen that in primitive men, and even in the
children of civilized nations, the power of origi-
nating changes is invariably associated with
knowledge and intention. To the unthinking
savage, every object, at any rate every striking
object, is the seat of a personality. Even to our
advanced Vedic forefathers, Indra, Vdyu, Varuna,
Agni — the powers that cause the phenomena of
2l6 THEISTIC PRESUPPOSITIONS OF SCIENCE CHAP.
rain, air, water and fire — were so many persons
that could be addressed and propitiated by their
worshippers. And even our own children kick,
as conscious offenders, the objects that hurt
them. But we, who have learnt to think
methodically, have, by our power of scientific
generalisation, reduced all powers in nature to
one single Power. Further, by a process of
abstraction, we have denuded the power of
originating changes of its necessary accompani-
ments of knowledge and intention, so that it is no
more will to us, but only an abstract quality
lying at the root of all change. In coming to
this way of thinking, we have both gained and
lost. We are right, as the modern discoveries
of science and philosophy tell us, in so far as we
trace all activities in nature to one single source.
We are also right in seeing that it is incon-
venient, if not quite incorrect, to call every
change in nature a divine volition. But we are
wrong in thinking, if we actually do so, that an
abstraction in thought is an actual division or
separation in reality, that a power of origination
is possible without thought and intention. Men
speak of force as something other than will and
credit it with all change in Nature, not thinking
that though we find it convenient to speak of
A TWO ALTERNATIVES OF THOUGHT 217
force as an abstract quality, we, can form no
clear notion of it in our minds apart from know-
ing and intending will.
"The fact is, that if we were left only with
our sensuous perceptions and sensuous images,
without the power of looking within and watch-
ing the workings of our minds (supposing that such
a state of existence were possible), we should have
no idea of originating power or force ; and for us
change would follow change without any causal
link to connect them. Force or the power of
origination is neither visible, audible, smellable,
tasteable nor tangible ; nor is it anything of
which a sensuous image can be formed in the
mind. It is a power of the mind, and is known
only by self-intuition ; and self-intuition reveals
it as dependent on knowledge and desire. If
therefore its existence in the external world is
to be believed, it must be conceived there as
having essentially the same nature as it possesses
in us. We may altogether dismiss the idea of
an originating power in nature, thinking it to be
an illegitimate projection in nature of a purely
internal experience — the experience of an origi-
nating will, — and try to satisfy ourselves with a
view of nature as a series of changes following
one another without any causal link. This is
2l8 THEISTIC PRESUPPOSITIONS OF SCIENCE CHAP.
what consistent Sceptics like Hume and Comte
tried to do, though we do not think they were
successful in rooting out such a fundamental
intuition as the intuition of power from their
minds. But if changes in nature are at all to
be referred to power, it must necessarily be
conceived as a Supreme Will, — a knowing, in-
tending and acting Mind. How this thought
helps us in feeling the nearness of God — in
realising him as living and acting incessantly in
and out of us, the reader will think for himself."
Now, as to the principle of reciprocity, everything
said about causality applies so well to it, that
I consider a separate treatment of it as unneces-
sary.
Coming next, then, to the biological sciences,
we find that, as in the case of the physical, these
sciences are agnostic not in so far as they are
scientific, but rather in so far as they stop short
of being real sciences. In so far as the objects
of these sciences are material bodies, they are
indeed perfectly justified in applying mechanical
principles, the principles of substance and
causality, the laws of matter and motion, to
them. And we have seen that even these prin-
ciples, rightly understood, lead us much further
than where ordinary Physical Science stops. But
A CONCEPTION OF DESIGN 219
organic matter, as organic, requires, for its proper
explanation, principles very different from the
mechanical. It is the teleological principle, the
principle of final cause or design, that alone can
explain organism, with its functions of life,
generation and growth. As Kant truly says, "No
Newton, we can say with certainty, will ever
rise to make intelligible to us, according to
mechanical causes, the germination of one blade
of grass." Life is a mystery and will ever remain
a mystery to the mere Mechanist, to him who
carefully excludes design from the explanation
of the products of nature. Let us take, for
instance, the most prominent characteristic of
life, its power of sustaining itself. Inorganic
products grow by accretion, by the external addi-
tion of one part to another, by one force acting
upon another. A vegetable or animal germ,
on the other hand, sustains itself by its ow^n
power. External matter is indeed added to it,
but this addition is due to its own internal
power. In its case, addition is not mere accre-
tion, as in inorganic objects, but assimilation^
the turning of external matter to its own use
by the inherent power of the germ. This assi-
milation itself is a most wonderful process, and
is inexplicable on mechanical principles. It
220 THEISTIC PRESUPPOSITIONS OF SCIENCE CHAP.
involves selection, which directly carries purpose
with it. Every germ assimilates just those
materials which favour its growth into the pro-
duct to which it tends, which is the end of its
process of growth ; and every finished organism
assimilates just what is required for its susten-
ance, and nothing else. And then, secondly,
while in the case of inorganic matter, the cause
determines the effect, the parts determine
the whole, the present determines the future, in
the case of organic matter, it is the effect that
determines the cause, the whole that determines
the parts, and the future that determines the
present. The seed grows into the tree, with
trunk, branches, leaves, flowers and fruits —
members which, in their turn, sustain the life of
the whole tree and contribute to the production
of seeds for the perpetuation of its kind. The
animal germ grows into the finished animal body,
with its complex system of organs, each devoted
to a particular function and all contributing to
the life and reproduction of the whole. In such
instances, we see that what comes last, the com-
pleted organism with its various functions, is
potentially contained in the seed or the germ and
determines its whole process of life and growth.
But this potential or determinant existence of
A ORGANISMS INEXPLICABLE BY MECHANICAL PRINCIPLES 221
the effect in the cause can mean nothing else
than this, that the idea or design of the effect
determines or works in the cause. Either say this, or
your explanation of organic phenomena explains
nothing. Now, biological science avoids teleology
or design just in so far as it ignores this fact of the
determination of the present by the future, this
relation of means and ends in organic phenomena.
Its success in doing without the principle of final
causes is only in so far as it is assimilated to
Physical Science, only inasmuch as it tries to
show that the growth and reproduction of organ-
isms can be explained by principles employed
in the latter. But organic phenomena refuse to
be explained by mechanical principles. The
unity of an organism, the relation of its parts as
means and ends to one another, its power of
sustaining and reproducing itself, are phenomena
which, on mechanical principles, are accidents.
Such principles fail to show that an organism
is a necessity. Inorganic nature, as it is, may
be shown to be the necessary result of the
fundamental laws of matter and motion. But
this necessity breaks down in the case of organic
nature. These laws fail to show why organisms
are what they are and not otherwise. So far as
they are concerned, therefore, organisms are
222 THEISTIC PRESUPPOSITIOXS OF SCIENXE CHAP.
mere accidents, or in other words, they are in-
explicable by mechanical laws and demand a
different explanation. If one or two organisms
arose here and there in nature, they might be
set down as accidental effects of mechanical
laws. But as they constitute a realm by them-
selves, arising with a constancy and regularity
as steady at least as the laws of physical sequence,
they clearly defy the power of these laws to
explain them. The constant and regular rise
of the most complex and intricate systems, in
which their complexity is co-ordinated to unity,
in which the parts exist for the whole and the
whole for the parts, in which the parts, organs
■or members are related as means and ends to
one another, can be explained only by purpose.
Exclude purpose from its explanation, and the
whole affair wears the aspect of an accident.
But the very essence of accident is irregularity.
When something happens with an invariable
constancy, it passess out of the category of
accidents, and its constancy demands a rational
explanation. In the case of organic phenomena,
this rational explanation cannot be anything
but purpose. The very nature of organisms, as
already described, makes mere mechanical ex-
planation unsatisfactory and irrational. As mere
A SIMILARITY OF HUMAN AND NATURAL ACTIONS 223
phenomena, mere events in time, all phenomena,
including human actions, are subject to the laws
of universal causation. But in so far as the actions
of human beings are related to one another, they
demand a higher determination, a higher ex-
planation, than the mechanical, the merely
physical. They require further to be ascribed to
purpose and free-will. Similar is the case with
the phenomena of organic nature. Their very
nature proves a higher determination than that
by merely physical causes. They have to be
traced to the designing will of a Being above
nature. The proof in the latter case is not a
bit less strong than in the former. If we know
the minds of our fellow-beings by examining the
nature of their actions, not less surely do we
know mind in nature by the same method. You
will find this point clearly put and dwelt on at
some length in Babu Nagendranath Chatturji's
Dharmajijndsd, pt. I, where you will also find
numerous illlustrations of design in nature.
Dr. James Martineau's Study of Religion is also
a very helpful book on the Design Argument,
I content myself with a brief statement of the
argument in the way I conceive to be the best
and pointing out its place in the system of
Theistic Evidences. I think that, from the stand-
224 THEISTIC PRESUPPOSITIONS OF SCIENCE CHAP.
point of science, it is organic nature that directly
calls for the teleological principle as its only
rational explanation ; and I have therefore
exhibited it as the real basis of the biological
sciences. But we have now to see that even
according to the scientific method this principle
is applicable to inorganic matter also. In a
broad sense, the whole world is an organism,
its various parts related to one another as means
and ends and all serving the purposes of life and
mind. The teleological nature of what we call
inorganic matter becomes evident if we see its
relation to organic beings. Air in itself, for in-
stance, may seem to be purposeless, to be ex-
plicable by mere chemical laws ; but chemistry
fails to explain it when we contemplate its re-
lation to life and living beings. Is the relation
of air to the lungs and the vital functions of
animals merely fortuitous ? Can any mechanical
laws even remotely explain this relation ? Does
any conceivable explanation satisfy Reason except
the one that ascribes the relation to design?
The same remark applies to the relation of light
to the eye, of sound to the ear, of food and
drink to the digestive organs, — in fact to the
relation of inorganic nature as a whole to organic
beings. Is this relation, with the various ends
A PRESUPPOSITIONS OF PSYCHOLOGY 225
of organic beings systematically served by it,
accidental, purposeless ? If it cannot be explained
by the laws of matter and motion with which
the physical sciences deal, it must be either
accidental or purposive ; and as the first of these
suppositions is excluded by the constant and
systematic nature of the relation in question,
the only rational explanation of it is that it is
due to the will of a conscious, intending Being
of transcendent power and wisdom to whom
nature, both organic and inorganic, is subject.
We now come to the third and last group of
the sciences, the mental and moral. The abstrac-
tion on which the inductive sciences, as at present
conceived, are based, is nowhere so patent as in
this final group. The science of mind, as at
present taught, takes for granted, if only as a
supposition, that the individual mind can be
known and made the subject matter of science
apart from the Infinite Mind. To many writers
on Psychology, this supposition is unfortunately
not a mere supposition, but a dogma, an agnostic
creed which they undertake to defend with elabo-
rate arguments. To many others, it is a con-
venient plea for avoiding discussions, more or less
theological or metaphysical, in which they feel
no interest and on which they do not like to
15
226 THEISTIC PRESUPPOSITIONS OF SCIENCE CHAP.
pronounce any judgment. Yet, the truth is that
these writers, almost at every turn in their treat-
ment of their science, make statements and
admissions which are nothing but disguised
confessions of faith in the Infinite Mind. In my
fourth lecture, I have ready shown, by an analysis
of knowledge, that we cannot know the subject
or the object, the individual or the universal soul,
in abstraction from each other, and that, in every
act of knowing the concrete reality known is a
subject-object, a spirit which has both a finite
and an infinite aspect, and which is both our own
self and the self of the universe. On the present
occasion, I shall particularly draw your attention
to what may be called the very fundamental
assumption on which Empirical Psychology is
based, the assumption, namely, that there is a
sub-conscious region in which mental facts,
sensations, ideas, judgments, etc., exist when
they are absent from our consciousness, — the con-
sciousness of individuals. You will see that
Psychology cannot do without this assumption.
In the individual, knowledge shines only inter-
mittently. Every moment we have command of
only a very small stock of ideas. The rest of
our ideas, — even those which we have already
acquired, remain behind in the background
A ABSTRACTION IMPLIED IK PSYCHOLOGY 227
of our consciousness, from which they come to
light and in which they disappear again and
again. Our mental life resembles a basin erected
round a perpetual spring, a basin in which the
water rises and collects awhile, and from which
it again disappears, repeating this process conti-
nually. It resembles such a basin rather than a
canvas on which images are permanently painted
and are always visible. In profound dreamless
sleep, as you know, our conscious life becomes a
perfect blank ; even self-consciousness, the basis
of all other forms of consciousness, being suspend-
ed. Now, here is the difficulty of Psychology
as a mere empirical science, as a science of mere
phenomena and their laws. Other sciences pro-
fessedly treat of their objects without any refer-
ence to the relation which they may have to the
mind. Not so Psychology. Its very object is
consciousness. It professes to deal only with
conscious phenomena and the laws of their
combination and association. And yet these
phenomena are found to be only fitful visitants
of the field which Psychology traverses — the field
of individual consciousness. Ever and anon they
disappear from this field and enter a region of
which this science, as at present conceived, pro-
fesses to know nothing. A region beyond cons-
228 THEISTIC PRESUPPOSITIONS OF SCIENCE CHAP.
ciousness is indeed a perfect blank to the science
of consciousness. Conscious phenomena, when
they cease to be conscious, are indeed nothing
to mental science properly so called, and the
modern science of the mind, if it were consistent,
would be speechless about conscious ph'^nomena
as soon as they left the region of individual
consciousness. But in that case it would cease
to be a science, and so, naturally enough, it does
not like to commit suicide in this fashion. Hence
it lives, and lives at the cost of consistency with
itself. It speaks of conscious phenomena becom-
ing unconscious, existing in a region of sub-
consciousness, and emerging from it again as
self-same conscious phenomena. But this is so
much pure nonsense, seeming to be sense because
it is continually spoken by thinkers and writers
who can think clearly and write cleverly on
certain things, but who lack the deepest and the
truest insight into things of the mind. The fact
is, if you consider your individuality to be the
only thing you know, and think that you know
nothing of a universal, ever-waking, all knowing
Mind in which your individuality is contained,
then, to be consistent, you ought to say, as soon
as a mental fact passes out of your individual
consciousness, that it has entirely ceased to be.
CONTRADICTIOX INVOLVED IX PSYCHOLOGY 229
and that it is impossible for it to revive or re-
appear. When, for instance, you forget this
lecture hall, you should say that the idea perishes
once for all and any recurrence or return is im-
possible for it. In losing it, you lose, as it were,
a part of yourself, a part of your conscious life,
for it is suffused with or constructed by your self-
consciousness. As your individual consciousness
exhausts your mental life, you cannot imagine
your lost idea as hidden in a corner of your mind
for a while and coming back to light again.
The only consistent course of thinking for you,
then, is to think, when you forget your idea, that
it is lost irrecoverably. Whatever ideas may
enter your mind after its loss can be only fresh,
new ideas, — belonging to a different period of
time and therefore numerically different pheno-
mena. But you knov^ that you cannot keep up
this consistency. After the lapse of a few
moments or after a few hours' oblivion, the idea
of the hall re-appears to your mind, and you
know surely that it is the same idea that occurred
to your mind before. You find that it is suffused,
pervaded, or constructed through and through
with your self — the self that knew it before and
persists till now, — that it is the lost part of your
self that is come back. But it could not come
230 THEISTIC PRESUPPOSITIONS OF SCIEN'CE CHAP.
back unless it existed during the time that it
was absent from your individual consciousness.
And in what other form could it exist than in a
conscious form — as an idea ? An idea existing
unthought of is as plain a contradiction in terms
as any can be. You are therefore forced to
admit that your individuality — your conscious
life moment after moment — is not sufficient in
itself, is not self-subsistent, but that your ideas,
your whole conscious life, must be contained in
a Mind which indeed is essentially one with
what you call your individual mind, but which
is higher than your individuality, for it never
forgets anything and never sleeps. Now, it has
always seemed to me rather strange, ladies and
gentlemen, that this plain fact, namely, that the
individual mind is not self-sustained, but lives,
moves and has its being in the Universal Mind —
a truth which was so plain to the rishis of the
Upanishads thousands of years ago, should be
so obscure and incomprehensible to modern
psychologists of the West. I rejoice to see, how-
ever, that the great American psychologist,
Professor James, has recognised this truth so far,
in his recent lectures on Varieties of Religious-
Experience, as to admit the existence of a very
large and sleepless mind behind every individual
A RELATION" OF PSYCHOLOGY TO THEOLOGY 23 1
mind. He seems yet incapable of feeling his
way to the doctrine of an indivisible Infinite
Mind as the support of all finite minds, though
he speaks of this doctrine with great respect.
I cannot but entertain the hope that Psychology,
in the near future, will see its true nature as a
science and be again, as it once was, the hand-
maid of Theology.
Now, the relation of Psychology to Theology
is a very large subject, and what I have said is,
as it were, only a drop from the ocean. But the
time allotted to me is over, and I must stop here.
I must forego the pleasure of speaking, on the
present occasion, of the religious implications
of the social and ethical sciences, specially as
I must deal, at some length, with the basis of
ethics and the nature of ethical judgments in
speaking of the moral perfections of God. May
the Holy Spirit be with us in the arduous task
still before us and lead us to the truth as it is
in him.
CHAPTER B
MR. BRADLEY ON THE DIVINE
PERSONALITY*
Mr. F. H. Bradley is perhaps the most eminent
philosophical writer of England at the present
time. His Ethical Studies, Principles of Logic
and Appearance and Reality are books which
may be said to have made epochs in English
thought. His last book, Essays on Truth and
Reality, which came out last year and a brief
mention of which was made in these columns
sometime ago, fully sustains his reputation as a
great thinker. Some chapters of this book are
specially interesting to those to whom religion
is not merely a matter of conduct and sentiment,
but also an object of philosophical thought. In
his Appearance and Reality, perhaps the most
profound metaphysical work in English, Mr.
* Reprinted from the Indian Messenger of March 21,
1915-
B MR. BRADLEY S ADVANCE TOWARDS THEISM 233
Bradley had pronounced personal immortality
as having only a slight probability in its favour.
His .lews on the divine personality also, as
expressed in that book, were likely to dissatisfy
and perhaps mystify people who look for help
and guidance in religious thought from eminent
philosophical writers. In the present volume
he seems to make a decided advance towards
views which are usually called Theistic, and the
writer himself admits this, so far as to say,
"There are points again where I desire to lay a
different emphasis upon some aspects of the
question" (that is, the personality of the Abso-
lute.) In another place he says, "I will touch
briefly on two points which I have elsewhere
discussed, laying at that time perhaps an undue
emphasis on one aspect of the matter. I refer
to the 'personality' of God and the 'immortality'
of the soul." (P. 438).
However, to understand Mr. Bradley's views
as set forth in his last work, it is necessary to
have some idea of his general views on Truth,
Reality and the nature of the Absolute. We
shall briefly state and explain these views in our
own way, — a way which, we hope, will not be
quite unintelligible to the thoughtful reader,
however unfamiliar he may he with the techni-
234 MR- BRADLEY ON THE DIVINE PERSONALITY CHAP.
calities of Philosophy. The current view as to
Reality is, as Mr. Bradley puts it, "that a thing
must be real or unreal, that, whatever things
are real, are real alike and equally, and that,
in short, with regard to reality it is always a
case of Yes or No. and never of more or less."
But according to Mr. Bradley there are degrees
in reality. Things that people ordinarily believe
to be absolutely real, as for instance, material
objects and their changes, our finite selves, and
even the personality of God, are to him only
partially or relatively so, and the x\bsolute, the
All, is alone fully or absolutely real. The
criterion by which Mr. Bradley tests the reality,
relative or absolute, of a thing, is nothing more
recondite than the well-known logical law of
non-contradiction or self-consistency. Time,
Space, Substance, Self, Personality, are all found
to involve contradictions and are hence pro-
nounced to be only Appearance, that is, partial
expressions of Reality, and the Absolute, as the
only self-consistent and non-contradictory thing,
is alone held to be fully or absolutely real. To
Mr. Bradley, the Absolute is Reality, Experience
and Happiness, — Sat, Chit and Ananda, in the
words of our Indian philosophy. He does not
use these Sanskrit words and never quotes from
B THE ABSOLUTE ALONE FULLY REAL 235
or refers to any Vedantic writings. But his
views have a most striking similarity to those
set forth in those writings. However, the
ordinary reader will have a clue to Mr. Bradley's
method if we refer him to the view often
expressed in the philosophical articles that
have appeared in this paper from time to time,
that an object of knowledge cannot be independ-
ent of the subject, — that to think that things
known can exist unknown, involves a contradic-
tion. When this truth is clearly understood, it
will be seen that things usually thought of as
fully real are only partially or relatively so, —
real only in relation to the knowing mind. On
the other hand, knowing minds or selves, which
seem to be independent of known objects, are
really unmeaning and inconceivable without
them. Mere subjects are as self-contradictory as
mere objects and therefore as much appearances
or partial realities as the latter. The full or
absolute reality, therefore, is that of which subjects
and objects are only partial or relative manifest-
ations. Mr. Bradley calls this Absolute Reality
'Experience'. He finds 'knowledge' and even 'self
inadequate to express the fulness, the all-inclu-
siveness, of the Absolute. In every act of know-
ledge, indeed, it is the Absolute, the All, that
236 MR. BRADLEY ON THE DIVINE PERSONALITY CHAP.
manifests itself. But as an act, a process, know-
ledge is partial and does not represent the
omnipresence and eternality of the Absolute.
The Absolute's 'experience' must comprehend all
things in space and all events in time in one
undivided and timeless vision. This distinction
of finite and infinite knowledge makes our sages
call Brahman jndnam and hesitate to call him a
jndni. However, Time and Space, like Object,
Subject and Knowledge, are self-contradictory,
and only partial and not absolute realities.
Events follow one another. But events are not
real in themselves, they are manifestations of
Experience, which neither precedes nor follows
anything. Time, therefore, is only an appearance
and not an absolute reality, the absolutely
Real being timeless. In the same manner,
one portion of space is external to another. But
Experience, to which space is relative, is not
external to anything, and 'things' external to one
another are all comprehended in it. It is abso-
lutely one and indivisible. Hence Space is only
an appearance and not a reality, the Real being
spaceless. From all this it follows that the
finite self, the self which is conceived as begin-
ning to be or to know, and to advance gradually
in its self-hood, is not absolutely real, but is real
B THE ABSOLUTE SUPER-PERSONAL 237
only in the degree it represents or manifests the
Absolute. And there can be no doubt that the
self represents the Absolute as nothing else does,
for experience, which is the fundamental charac-
teristic of the Absolute, is also the essence of
the self. Now, here comes in the question of
personality. The self in each of us appears in
the form of a person, a person excluding other
persons and excluding things not included in our
personality. Now, if personality necessarily
implies this exclusion, this finitude, the Absolute,
which includes every person and thing, and
excludes none, cannot indeed be personal. In
this sense, in the sense of its all-inclusiveness,
Mr. Bradley calls it super-personal, that is, not
below% but above, personality. This should not
lead the reader to assimilate Mr. Bradley's
Absolute in any sense to Mr. Spencer's, for the
latter is neither Experience nor Happiness, which
the former is. And Mr. Bradley's Absolute
is not only Experience and Happiness — Chit and
Ananda77i, — but also Spirit, Will and Love, as
the following quotations from Essays on Truth
and Reality will show : "A God that can say to
himself T as against you and me, is not in my
judgment defensible as the last and complete
truth for Metaphysics. But, that being admitted,
238 MR. BRADLEY ON THE DIVINE PERSONALITY CHAP.
the question remains as to what God is for
religion. The religious consciousness must re-
present to itself the Good Will in its relations
with mine. It must express both our difference
and our unity. And must not, it will be asked,
that representation take the form of a 'personal'
God? I answer that to insist here on 'must' to
myself seems untenable, but on the other hand,
I am fully prepared to accept 'may'. But there
is one condition on which I have to lay stress.
The real presence of God's will in mine, our
actual and literal satisfaction in common, must
not in any case be denied or impaired. This is
a religious truth far more essential than God's
'personality' and hence that personality must be
formulated, no matter how inconsistently, so as
to agree with this truth and to support it." (p.
433.) Again, "The highest Reality, so far as I
see, must be super-personal. At the same time
to many minds practical religion seems to call
for the belief in God as a separate individual.
And, where truly that belief is so required, I can
accept it as justified and true, but only if it is
supplemented by other beliefs which really con-
tradict it. And these other beliefs, I must add,
are more vital for religion. A God who has made
this strange and glorious nature outside of which
B GOD THE INinVELLING SELF OF ALL 239
he remains, is an idea at best one-sided. Con-
fined to this idea we lose large realms of what is
beautiful and sublime, and even for religion our
conception of goodness suffers. Unless the Maker
and Sustainer becomes also the indwelling Life
and Mind and the Inspiring Love, how much of
the Universe is impoverished !"
It is evident that in combating the 'personality'
of God, Mr. Bradley opposes only the popular
conception of an anthropomorphic God supposed
to be outside of and thus virtually limited by
the material world and the soul of man, and
not the Sarvahhutdntardtman, the Indwelling Self
of all creatures, who was worshipped by the rishis
of the Upanishads and is now worshipped by their
modern followers of various denominations
CHAPTER C
MONISM, PLURALISM AND THEIR
RECONCILIATION*
I
Beyond the din and bustle of war, political
ambition and commercial expansion, the reflect-
ive mind notices a steady growth of higher
thought — thought about God, Immortality and
the Kingdom of the Spirit — in the advanced
nations of the world. This growth is the real
promise of the lasting peace and happiness of
future humanity. It is most marked — at any
rate to those, like ourselves, who look at the
world through English spectacles — in England
and the United States of America. Germany
perhaps, as we have been noticing for nearly half
a century, and as appears from what has been
and is being written about it recently, has not
* Reprinted from the Indian Messenger of May i6 and
23. 1915-
C PRESENT SITUATION' IX PHILOSOPHY 24I
gone on in the forward march of higher philo-
sophy after its great contribution to the interest
under Leibnitz, Kant and Hegel. Eucken indeed
is very popular, but beyond emphasising the
practical aspect of philosophy, he has really
contributed nothing new and original. France
indeed is philosophically awake in Bergson, but
Bergson's philosophy is still in the making, and
it will yet take some time for the world to learn
clearly what he has to say on the great problems
of mind and life. His main attempt seems to be
directed to correcting the one-sidedness of Ideal-
istic Absolutism, — to the exposition of the reality
of time and change. The chief interest of philo-
sophy seems at present to be centred in the
subject which forms the title of this paper. It is
a refreshing characteristic of present-day philo-
sophical thought and discussion that there are
no great minds who care to defend either
materialism or the duality of matter and mind.
These doctrines are now confined to the unreflect-
ive and the unphilosophical. The more reflect-
ive minds, specially those who are in touch with
higher philosophical literature, see now the reality
of mind perhaps more clearly than was ever seen
in any other age of the world, and to all who
have given us systems of thought, mind is the sole
16
242 MOKISM, PLURALISM AND THEIR RECONCILIATION' CHAP.
reality, whether conceived in a monistic or
pluralistic form. In our articles on "Mr. Bradley
on Immortality and the Divine Personality",
which appeared in the Indian Messenger in its
issues of March 21 and 28, we ha^^e seen that the
most eminent philosophical thinker of England
at the present day is a spiritual monist. We
also saw in those articles his method of approach-
ing the great problems of mind — what may
roughly be called the critical method — the
method of philosophical analysis and synthesis
guided by the law of non-contradiction. In its
essence it is the same as the Dialectical Method
of Hegel. But though acknowledging great in-
debtedness to Hegel, Mr. Bradley does not profess
to be a close follower of his method. Professor
John McTaggart of Cambridge, an able exponent
of the Hegelian Philosophy, is another leading
thinker of the day. He differs from Bradley and
the early English Hegelians, — Stirling, Green, the
Cairds, and their younger followers, — in represent-
ing the Absolute not as a unitary Spirit, but as
a Unity of spirits and he thinks that his exposi-
tion of Hegel's meaning is a truer exposition than
that of the writers just named. According to
him every human personality is a partial and
temporary reproduction of a distinct eternal
C DR. MCTAGGAHT S VIEWS 243
person in whom the whole of reality is eternally
particularised and who has therefore both a finite
and an infinite aspect, and Absolute Reality is
a unity of such persons, — a unity which, so far
as we may know and conceive it, is not personal.
That human personality, in the imperfect and
broken form which it assumes in our lives,
cannot be conceived except in relation to — except
as the reproduction of — a perfect all-inclusive
Person, is a thought which must already be
familiar to our readers. What we know moment
after moment must be thought of as connected
with all that we, as individuals subject to the
limitations of time and space, do not know —
connected in a Mind which is above such limi-
tations, but which is at the same time essentially
one with what we call our own mind. But is it
the same Mind that forms the absolute ground of
all our minds ? Reality indeed is one, its unity
being implied in all forms of knowledge and in
all our mutual relations, intellectual and moral.
But is the unity that of a single Mind or Person ?
If so, what would be the meaning of the
innumerable differentiations of the world — of the
countless persons, distinct from and often hostile
to one another, of whom human society is com-
posed ? If there were no differentiations in the
244 MONISM, PLURALISM AND THEIR RECONCILIATION CHAP.
Original, how could they be found in the repro-
ductions ? Besides, personality or self-conscious-
ness is such an integral, indivisible thing, that
one cannot share it with others, and a single
Person including other persons in himself cannot
be conceived. Considerations like these lead Dr.
McTaggart to conclude that the Absolute is an
impersonal Unity of spirits eternally distinct from
and yet related to one another, who, as subjects,
exclude one another, but, as objects, are included
in one another. Dr. McTaggart defends the
Hegelian character of his doctrine by referring to
that part of the Dialectic in which Hegel treats
of the category of Life. One quotation from
his Studies in Hegelian Cosmology will make his
meaning clear. In distinguishing Hegel's view
of the Absolute from that of Lotze, he says on
p. 31 of the book: ''But this is not Hegel's view.
He reaches in the category of Life a result from
which he never departs in the subsequent
categories — that the unity and plurality are in
an absolutely reciprocal relation, so that while
the plurality is nothing but the differentiation of
the unity, the unity is nothing but the union of
the plurality."
We see then how Hegelianism, though a
system of Monism, approaches Pluralism in some
C DR. HALDAR S CRITICISM OF MCTAGGART 245
of its representations. Of real Pluralism, how-
ever, Pluralism unmodified by Monism, we shall
treat later on. Its chief representative is the
American psychologist, James, lately deceased.
But before we cross the Atlantic, we may as well
turn once to our own country and see what one
of our own thinkers — a deep and subtle thinker
and an able writer on philosophy, chiefly in the
form of articles in the English and American
reviews, but who has also given us two little but
deeply thoughtful books— has to say on the recon-
ciliation of Monism and Pluralism. Dr. Hiralal
Haldar, in his Ph. D. thesis on Hegelianism and
Human Personality, accepts the doctrine of the
Absolute as eternally differentiated into persons,
having come to the conclusion by independent
thinking before Dr. McTaggart wrote his Cosmo-
logy. But he ably and, as it seems to us, very
successfully combats McTaggart's view of the im-
personality of the Absolute. One extract from
Dr. Haldar's essay will show the line of argu-
ment taken by him. On p. 29 he says : "Each
particular self, in so far as it contains everything,
is identical with the Supreme Reality within
which everything falls. Its consciousness, as all-
embracing, must coincide with the Supreme Reality,
and the Supreme Reality, on its part, must
246 MONISM, PLURALISM AN'D THEIR RECON'CILIATIOX CHAP,
therefore coincide with its consciousness and
hence be conscious. I do not see how it is
possible to evade this conclusion. A particular
differentiation of the Absolute, as a finite deter-
minate thing, excludes all others, but it includes
everything, not in its own strength, but in virtue
of the identity of its all-embracing consciousness
with the Ultimate Reality, which cannot conse-
quently be other than consciousness. The con-
ception of a particular self ideally including
everything becomes tenable only on the supposi-
tion that the inclusion is also real, and if the
ideal inclusion is conscious inclusion, so the real
inclusion must also be." And, as Dr. Haldar
says briefly in another place, "Once touched
with self- consciousness at a particular point,
where, be it remembered, it (the Absolute) is
completely personal, how can it ever shake it
off ?...So if the Absolute is a person in me, it
must itself have personality."
In the second part of our article we shall
speak of the Pluralism, Humanism or Pragmatism,
as it is variously called, of Professors James and
Ward, and of its attitude towards Theism.
PLURALISM 247
II
The prevailing heresy of the day, the lineal
successor of Mill's Scepticism and Spencer's
Agnosticism, is Pluralism, called also Humanism,
because it conceives the world as an assemblage
of human or finite spirits, and Pragmatism,
because to it the true is identical with the useful
or practical. It professes to be a system of
Empiricism, " Radical Empiricism," in the
words of its chief advocate. Professor James. It
is almost as blind as the elder Empiricism to the
fact that its opponents — at any rate many of
them — also appeal, not to innate or a priori
ideas, but to experience itself, and that the only
difference between it and them lies in the different
interpretations given of experience on each side.
In still another characteristic it resembles its
elder sister, and that is its impatience in studying
the literature of the opposite school. The result
is an over-weening confidence in itself and an
exaggerated idea of its victory over enemies
mostly the creatures of its own imagination. In
going through James's Pluralistic Universe, one
is struck with the author's superficial knowledge
of the Absolutist writers he mentions and criti-
cises. There is nowhere any attempt to system-
atically state or summarise the arguments of
240 MONISM, PLURALISM AND THEIR RECONCILIATION CHAP.
these writers, to enter into the analysis of ex-
perience given by them, and then to show its
insufficiency or to expose any unwarrantable
assumptions that may be involved therein. The
whole criticism resolves into the suggestion of
a number of difficulties which the theistic or
monistic theory of the world cannot fully meet.
On its own part, Pluralism undertakes no analysis
of experience. Its assumption that the world
consists of a plurality of distinct selves of all
grades of development, from the lowest forms of
life to the most highly refined souls, it takes as
a given fact — as the practical presupposition of
all knowledge and activity. Having started
from this assumption, it shows how the instinct
of self-preservation and growth inherent in each
conscious unit of the world leads it to struggle,
to act on and be acted on by its fellows, and
thus to gather experience and gain strength. To
the Monist or the philosophical Theist, the whole
description of this growth in experience on the
part of fundamentally isolated individuals — for
instance the one given in Professor Ward's Realm
of Ends, — seems little better than so much my-
thology. To him, the individual cannot be
conscious of himself without feeling himself,
however vaguely at first, one with a Universal
PLURALISTIC ASSUMPTIONS 249
which at the same time transcends him infinitely.
His self-consciousness is simply bound up with
the consciousness of a universal life. The Pluralist
therefore starts with a false assumption — an as-
sumption which is by no means a fundamental
datum of experience. The individual does not —
he simply cannot — start with an idea of himself
as an isolated unit surrounded by other units
quite distinct from him. He starts with an idea
of himself as a part of a whole — a whole which
he jeels to be conscious, but only gradually knows
and thinks to be so as he grows more and more
reflective. When he thinks of other units like
himself, he thinks of them also as parts of a
whole — the same whole of which he is a part.
Now, false in his start, the Pluralist is false also
in the account he gives of the growth and ac-
cumulation of experience in the individual.
Experience cannot grow and accumulate in a self
merely individual — one whose consciousness is
limited to the immediacy of time and space.
Such a self, a self subject to sleep and oblivion,
is incapable of conserving its momentary ex-
periences, uniting them and developing them into
the knowledge, wisdom and strength which
•constitute the glory of humanity. All this im-
plies in him the presence of Something which
250 MONISM, PLURALISM AND THEIR RECOXCILIATION CHAP.
transcends the limitations implied in individuality.
Neither can a mere individual have any com-
merce or connection with other individuals. The
Pluralist only takes such connection for granted
and does not see its necessary implications.
These implications are the existence of a single
universal and undivided Experience and its re-
production or particularisation in the form of
individual experiences. If the moving of the
water of a single tank causes the water of other
tanks to move, or if the ringing of the bell
of a single temple rings also the bells of
other temples, the tanks and the temples
in question must have a bond of unity, some-
thing which is common to all of them. Infinitely
deeper must be the Unity which makes possible
the complex and diversified relations of the social
and spiritual life of humanity. And the Unity
underlying conscious beings must be itself con-
scious. But the Pluralist thinks he can do
without such a Unity. Professor James took
great interest in religion. For the mystical and
the unusual in religion specially, he had a
theosophist's passion and avidity. But in his
Varieties of Religious Experience, though he allows
a very large subliminal self behind every waking
human self, he confesses he does not see the
C PROF. WARD S PLURALISTIC THEISM 25I
necessity of postulating a common universal self
behind all. If there is a God at all, he thinks,
that God cannot be the Absolute — he may only
be a very great individual among individuals,
primus inter pares. Professor Ward, in his book
named above, arrives at a more satisfactory
conclusion. In the earlier parts of his book, he
attempts to construct a purely pluralistic universe
with the activities, individual and combined, of
its component parts. This attempt reminds one
of J. S. Mill's attempt to construct a purely
sensationalist universe of mere " possibilities of
sensation" and " laws of association " without
any ontological principle. But as Professor
Ward proceeds, and has done with his criticism
of the ordinary theistic conceptions of a world
governed by fixed laws under an all-seeing and
perfectly good God, he by and by sees, — much
in the same way in which Mill latterly admitted
an ontological basis of his " possibilities " and
the probablity of a personal God, — that, after
all, the theistic interpretation of the universe is
far more reasonable than the pluralistic one.
Once, however, on the high road to 'Faith',
which he extols over Reason, he gradually
comes to attribute to God all the perfections
which a devout Theist believes in, though
252 MONISM, PLURALISM AND THEIR RECONCILIATION CHAP,
on grounds quite unsatisfactory to those who
are not gifted with any great "wish to be-
lieve," and who, with Tennyson, see "more faith
in honest doubt than in all your creeds." We
may illustrate the unsatisfactoriness of Professor
Ward's procedure by an extract from the con-
cluding chapter of his book. He says on p. 436 :
"Not content with the admission that Pluralism
on examination points both theoretically and
practically beyond itself, many advocates of
Singularism (by which term Professor Ward
evidently means Absolutist Monism) have attempt-
ed to show it up as radically absurd. These
attempts do not appear successful. That an
absolute totality of individuals is self-contradic-
tory and that an absolute individual (by which
term the Professor evidently means the Monist's
Absolute) is not, is more than any one has yet
proved. That a plurality of individuals in isola-
lation should ever come into relation, is incon-
ceivable indeed, but only because a plurality
without unity is itself inconceivable. That in-
dividuals severally distinct as regards their ex-
istence could not interact, is however a mere
dictimi. Pluralism takes the world as we find it,
as a plurality of individuals unified in and through
their mutual intercourse. 'Radically empirical'
MR. BRADLEY ON PLURALISM 253
this certainly is, but if it be true, we are entitled
to ask the Singularist how he ever got started
on the a priori road. We approach Theism then
as promising to complete Pluralism, not as
threatening to abolish it, as providing theoretical-
ly more unity in the ground of the world, and
practically a higher and fuller unity in its
meaning and end." We need not stop to point
out the contradictions and misconceptions in-
volved in this extract. What we have said
above will perhaps somewhat help the reader to
see them.
We shall close with one or two extracts from
Mr. Bradley's short criticism of Pluralism,
specially that of Professor James, in his Essays on
Truth and Reality. His estimate of the system
is so unappreciative, that though he has given
only about a hundred pages to it in a book of
nearly five hundred, he says in his preface : "I
have been unwilling to include so many pages
on Pragmatism. The subject certainly does not
occupy a corresponding space in my mind." Mr.
Bradley refers in several places of his book to
Professor James's ignorance of Absolutism. We
extract only a small footnote : "Prof. James's
idea as to Absolutism, that it is a way of getting
what you want without paying anything for it,
254 MONISM, PLURALISM AND THEIR RECONCILIATION CHAP.
is surely (to any one who knows) a striking
revelation of the limits of his knowledge." Of
the general character of James's work, he says,
"Assuredly I am not alone in the desire that he
would turn his back for a time on sporadic
articles and on popular lectures, with their
intolerence and half-heartedness and more or
less plausible arguments, and would work in
the way in which a man who seriously aims at
a new philosophy is condemned to work, and
with a result which I at least feel sure would
repay his labour. And perhaps in the mean time
he might remind his followers on this side of
the Atlantic that, of course without prejudice
to the future, it is not yet true that the crowing
of the cock brings the sun above the horizon."
The last sentence refers evidently to the jubilant
cry of James's admirers that the sun of a new
system has risen on the philosophical horizon.
Mr. Bradley closes his examination of Pragma-
tism with the following words on Prof. James's
place as a philosopher : "Judging so far as I
can judge, I must doubt that claim, to take high
rank as a metaphysician, which has been made
not by, but on behalf of. Prof. James. I cannot
find in his metaphysical views (as I understand
them) much real originality, and what I miss,
C PROF. JAMES AS A METAPHYSICIAN 255
perhaps even more, in his metaphysics, is the
necessary gift of patient labour and persistent
self-criticism. With all his merits as a philo-
sopher, and assuredly they are great, I cannot
think it is as a metaphysician that Prof. James's
name will hold its place in the history of
thought." "But Prof. James's contribution to
Psychology," he says in another place, "will re-
main, I believe, indubitable."
OTHER WORKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR
8. Hindu Theism : A Defence and Exposition. Som
Brothers, 30, Goabagan Lane, Calcutta. Re. 1-8.
9. The XJpanishads in Devanagari and English characters,
in t\v 5 volumes. Som Brothers. Rs. 3-8.
10. The Religion of Brahman or The Creed of Educated
Hindus. Elysium Press, 3, Fariapukur Street, Calcutta. As. 8.
11. Sankaracharya : His Life and Teachings. Elysium
Press. As. S.
12. Maitreyi : a Vedic Stoni'. Natesan & Co., 4, Sanku-
ram Chetty Street, Madras. As. 4.
13. The Philosophy of Sankaracharya in Natesan's " Sir
Sankaracharya." As. i::.
14. Gleams of the New Light ; Essays in exposition of
some leading principles of pure Theism, doctrinal and practical.
Sadharan Brahmo Samaj Office, 211, Cornwallis Street, Calcutta,
As. 5.
15. The Roots of Faith : Essays on the grounds of belief
in God and in criticism of Scepticism and Agnosticism. Sadha-
ran Brahmo Samaj Office. As. 5.
16. Whispers from the Inner Life : Essays on Theistic
Ideals and Experiences. Sadharan Brahmo Samaj Office. As. 4.
17. Thirstinsr after God : Prayers offered in times of
private devotions. Sadharan Brahmo Samaj Office. As. 2.
18. JTt«HfH— ^''^'Tt'Rf^W^ itwt^^l Itft^l 3lWRt^
^^Fttrtsira I ^ ^f^ ^t^ I
19. 3t^!rt-f^^1-^t?r¥-^tf^t?[ ^tWt^ I ft«ft?1 3lWRt^
•^^Tt^?I I ^ Ftf^ 'Sft'll I
20. f^t^R^— *?^t$|<( ^|%1f ^ '^^ IW^ -21^^ I Ttft^t
BL Tattvabhushan, Sitanath
200 Brahma,] ijnasa or an
T283 inquiry into philosophical
1916 basis of Theism
PLEASE DO NOT REMOVE
CARDS OR SLIPS FROM THIS POCKET
UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO LIBRARY
Live Music Archive
Librivox Free Audio
Metropolitan Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Internet Arcade
Console Living Room
Books to Borrow
Open Library
TV News
Understanding 9/11