Atma Dharma

Author(s): Champat Rai Jain
Publisher: Champat Rai Jain

Page 19

( 12 )
apply our mind to feel this unique substance or thing, termed the soul, which is the fountainspring of happiness. Do we not put our lips in contact with a mango fruit to enjoy its taste? Just so with the soul ! If you would experience the delight and bliss of the Immortals, then you must first place yourself in contact with your soul; with the lips' of attention you should extract the sweet nectar of joy from the divine life-giving fruit. But, in order to experience the true joy that is inherent in the soul, we must know how to distinguish it from other things in the world. This means that we should know some distinguishing feature that shall unmistakeably point to the soul.
Now, such a distinguishing feature of souls is consciousness; so that, wherever you come across consciousness-the power to experience different kinds of sensations through the senses, thought, memory, inference, willing, emotional activity, passions and the like-there you may safely pre
C
*Cf. "There are two kinds of ajiva (non-living) substance; that which is endowed with sensible qualities-colour, smell and the like -namely, matter, and that which is devoid of such qualities; e. g., space. For this reason the quality of being amurtika (devoid of sensible qualities) is not regarded as a distinguishing feature of soul. The wise should always regard consciousness as the distinguishing mark of souls, for it is not found in anything else and is always present in them in some form or other."-The Samayasara Kalasha, by Amrita Chandra,