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VEDÂNTA-SOTRAS.
world, we have to conclude from the circumstance that there is no other guiding being. Ordinarily material causes, indeed, such as lumps of clay and pieces of gold, are dependent, in order to shape themselves into vessels and ornaments, on extraneous operative causes such as potters and goldsmiths; but outside Brahman as material cause there is no other operative cause to which the material cause could look; for Scripture says that previously to creation Brahman was one without a second.—The absence of a guiding principle other than the material cause can more. over be established by means of the argument made use of in the Satra, viz. accordance with the promissory statements and the illustrative examples. If there were admitted a guiding principle different from the material cause, it would follow that everything cannot be known through one thing, and thereby the promissory stateinents as well as the illustrative instances would be stultified.—The Self is thus the operative cause, because there is no other ruling principle, and the material cause because there is no other substance from which the world could originate.
24. And on account of the statement of reflection (on the part of the Self).
The fact of the sacred texts declaring that the Self reflected likewise shows that it is the operative as well as the material cause. Passages like 'He wished, may I be many, may I grow forth,' and 'He thought, may I be many, may I grow forth,' show, in the first place, that the Self is the agent in the independent activity which is preceded by the Self's reflection; and, in the second place, that it is the material cause also, since the words 'May I be many' intimate that the reflective desire of multiplying itself has the inward Self for its object.
25. And on account of both (i. e. the origin and the dissolution of the world) being directly declared (to have Brahman for their material cause).
This Sätra supplies a further argument for Brahman's
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