________________
xx] Ontological categories according to Venkaṭanatha 285 sense-characters it is impossible to point out anything as "present," since these are only perceived as "before" and "after"; by the time anything could be designated as "present" it is already past. Thus the point of time as present is undemonstrable. If the time as present may be affirmed of any sense-character, it may be affirmed of time itself. Again if time were non-existent, what is the use of assuming its imposition? If it is held that there is only the imposition of time-conception without any entity of which it is affirmed, then it would become the blind phenomenalism of the nihilists. In the Rāmānuja view of things it is possible somehow to affirm the notion as "present" of time just as it is affirmed of the sense-characters. It cannot be said that time is merely a character of the sensibles, and that there is no other entity as time apart from these sensibles; for the temporal character of the sensibles as "present" is only possible on the assumption that there is such a thing as "present" time. Again if the "present" is denied, then that would mean universal negation, for the past and future are never perceived by us. Moreover, the present cannot be conceived as something different or unrelated and independent of the past and the future. If the past and the future were regarded as constituting the present, then our experience would only be related to the past and the future and there would be no possibility for any of our present afflictions. "Present" thus may be regarded as that series of operations which has begun but has not as yet ended in fruition.
Though time is one and eternal it can appear as limited and many, like all other objects which, though they may remain as one, may yet be supposed to be many and different in respect of the states through which they may seem to pass by virtue of the various conditional qualities (upādhi-sambandha) with which they may be associated. Though this view may be regarded as sufficient in explaining the notion of limited time, yet there are others who think that unless time itself is supposed to be constituted of moments through which time as changeable may be apprehended, the association of conditions to explain the notion of limitation will be impossible; for such an association presupposes the fact of limitation in time to which alone the conditions could be referred. Thus, Yadavaprakāśa holds that time is beginningless and endless, and continually transforms itself through moments by which the divisions of time as hours, days and nights can be spanned; through
