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AN EPITOME OF JAINISM.
The seed is the seed under parti cular conditions.
find that the granular protoplasmic particles -the contents of the outer shell, the cuticle, which holds together the granules in a particular combination is all through uniform both in texture and chemical composition without any difference and differentiation between its parts in the primary stage of its being. If you crush the seed so instinct with the potency of development, it will not bud forth and why not? There are the component parts of the seed-the granules not an atom of which has been lost in any way. Why would it not then develop into a tree?
The answer is simple enough and we need not travel far to look for it. The seed is the seed under a particular arrangement and disposition of its constituent elements and as such it is the substantial cause having the potency of developing itself into a tree of its own type, if only the determining causes conjoin with one another to help its growth. But the crushing of the seed interferes with the relative disposition and arrangement of its constituent elements and thus has rendered it impossible for the five-fold determining causes to act on the seed.
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