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II ADHYAYA, 2 PÂDA, I.
365
out that a non-intelligent thing which, without being guided by an intelligent being, spontaneously produces effects capable of subserving the purposes of some particular person is nowhere observed in the world. We rather observe that houses, palaces, couches, pleasure-grounds, and the like things which according to circumstances are conducive to the obtainment of pleasure or the avoidance of pain-are made by workmen endowed with intelligence. Now look at this entire world which appears, on the one hand, as external (i. e. inanimate) in the form of earth and the other elements enabling (the souls) to enjoy the fruits of their various actions, and, on the other hand, as animate, in the form of bodies which belong to the different classes of beings, possess a definite arrangement of organs, and are therefore capable of constituting the abodes of fruition; look, we say, at this world, of which the most ingenious workmen cannot even form a conception in their minds, and then say if a non-intelligent principle like the pradhâna is able to fashion it! Other non-intelligent things such as stones and clods of earth are certainly not seen to possess analogous powers. We rather must assume that just as clay and similar substances are seen to fashion themselves into various forms, if worked upon by potters and the like, so the pradhâna also (when modifying itself into its effects) is ruled by some intelligent principle. When endeavouring to determine the nature of the primal cause (of the world), there is no need for us to take our stand on those attributes only which form part of the nature of material causes such as clay, &c., and not on those also which belong to extraneous agents such as potters, &c.1 Nor (if remembering this latter point) do we enter into conflict with any means of right knowledge; we, on the contrary, are in direct agreement with Scripture which teaches that an intelligent
If we attempt to infer the nature of the universal cause from its effects on the ground of parallel instances, as, for instance, that of an earthen jar whose material cause is clay, we must remember that the jar has sprung from clay not without the co-operation of an intelligent being, viz. the potter.
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