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CHAPTER IV
119
Dvaitism, as it stands, however, declares : "An individual or an object is what it is in virtue of its difference from other objects belonging to the same class or genus and difference ipso facto from members of another class or genus. Whether the linguistic medium is used or not, whether there is outward expression or not, difference is the essential constituent of an object or individual. An object is what it is only on account of its difference from other objects. Difference is emphasised. In accordance with the pragmatic purpose of the subject, and in accordance with the fundamental and essential constitution of the objects themselves, difference is stressed. It is difference that lends significance to identity".' This admission of fact that "It is difference that lends significance to identity" brings Dvaitism under the category of the Vaiseṣika system in which identity is subordinated to difference. It is, therefore, not surprising that Madhva, like many of the other earlier commentators on Vedāntasūtras, finds in the Jaina view of reality, viz., a co-ordinate conception of identity-in-difference, 'an admission' which, it is stated, is not merely 'against all reason and proof' but even 'contradictory'.
1. RRS, p. 239 (italics are mine). See also p. 509 where identity is referred to as a 'doctrinal fact'.
2. See The Vedantasūtras, with Madhva's Comm., E. T. S. Subba Rau, Madras, 1904, p. 119. Cf. also: Śrī Brahmasütrārtha Sargraha (The Brahmasutras of Bādarāyaṇa, expounded in Kanarese, in accordance with the Commentary of Madhvācārya) P. Ramchandra Row, Madras, 1903, p. 97.
