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776
Presidential Address
in the four famous schools of Buddhist Philosophy, viz., the schools of the Vaibhashikas, the Sautrāntikas, the Yogachāras and the Madhyamikas, maintaining, respectively the doctrines of Direct Realism, Indirect Realism, Idealistic Phenomenalism, and Nihilistic Mediism. Of these, Sarvästivada or the doctrine that "All is real" associated with the school of the Vaibhāshikas, is said to be the earliest. But obviously, if there is any point in the 'सर्व' (all) of सर्वास्तिवाद it must have been preceded by a doctrine in which a part of Reality was affirmed and the rest denied. This must be evidently the doctrine of Idealism, in which ideas are declared to be the only reals. The conjecture is justified by our knowledge of the earlier
* The Madhyamikas or Madhyamakas were advocates of the metaphysical 'Middle Path' an expression probably intended to correspond to the ethical Middle Path' (madhyama pratipad) of Gautama Buddha. The two exremes which they repudiate area and art which at the middle or meetingpoint destroy each other, leaving nothing but
शुन्यता as the core of Reality. This at which is deduced as a logical consequence of the doctrine of the Middle Path is not to be confounded with 3, which is relative as distinguished from the former which is absolute,
“gredifa zreátfa zùsfq x-ar
शुद्धी अशुद्धीति इमेऽपि अन्ता ।
ang ara faasifurar
मध्ये हि स्थानं प्र ( मध्येऽपि स्थानं न करोति पण्डितः ॥
-Simādhirāja Sútra.
aðÌ 219141¤IPASauftarqa adxanıangeafasyon great regni sfâng neaùr ari geg=à
-Malhyamikā Vṛtti,
