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globes the whole space of the world is literally packed, From them some souls are from time to time realised and sent up the scale of living beings to fill the vacancies occasioned by the liberation of souls who have reached perfection. For there is a scale of beings from the lowest upto animals, men and gods; up and down this scale the beings ascend or descend in their successive briths according to their merit or demerit as the case may be. But only in a human birth it is possible to reach "mukti" absolute perfection. I have given only the outline of the Jain doctrine of life, Jiva, which is one of the most characteristic of this system,
THE JAIN LITERATURE I abstain from entering on more details. I have tried in the preceding part of my lecture to describe only a few of these teachings which are in a high degree characteristic of Jainism. These doctrines have been worked out in all their details, and discussion of them forms the subject of numerous commentaries & other treatises in the very voluminous literature of the Jains. The mention of Jain literature brings me the last subject which I intend to touch upon in my
lecture. I will not dwell on the sacred literature Shree Sudharmaswami Gyanbhandar-Umara, Surat www.umaragyanbhandar.com
