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308 Philosophy of the Rāmānuja School of Thought [ch. ledge is verbal knowledge and as such cannot be regarded as immediate and direct perception.
Fifth Objection. Sarkara's reply to the above objection is that though the final knowledge of the identity of all things with self be attained yet the illusion of world-appearance may still continue until the present body be destroyed. To this Verkața asks that if avidyā be destroyed through right knowledge, how can the worldappearance still continue? If it is urged that though the aridyā be destroyed the root-impressions (rāsanā) may still persist, then it may be replied that if the vāsanā be regarded as possessing true existence then the theory of monism fails. If rāsanā is regarded as forming part of Brahman, then the Brahman itself would be contaminated by association with it. If rāsanā is, however, regarded as a product of avidyā, then it should be destroyed with the destruction of aridyā. Again, if the rāsunā persists even after the destruction of aridyā, how is it to be destroyed at all? If it can be destroyed of itself, then the avidyā may as well be destroyed of itself. Thus there is no reason why the rāsanā and its product, the world-appearance, should persist after the destruction of avidyā and the realization of Brahma-knowledge.
Seventh Objection. Sankara and his followers say that the utterance of the unity text produces a direct and immediate perception of the highest truth in the mind of a man chastened by the acquirement of the proper qualifications for listening to the Vedāntic instructions. That the hearing of the unity texts produces the immediate and direct perception of the nature of self as Brahman has to be admitted, since there is no other way by which this could be explained. To this I erkața replies that if this special case of realization of the purport of the unity texts be admitted as a case of direct perception through the instrumentality of verbal audition only because there is no other means through which the pure knowledge of Brahman could be realized, then inference and the auditory knowledge of other words may equally well be regarded as leading to direct perception, for they also must be regarded as the only causes of the manifestation of pure knowledge. Moreover, if the causes of verbal knowledge be there, how is that knowledge to be prevented, and how is the direct and immediate perception to be produced from a collocation of causes which can never produce it? Any knowledge gained at a particular time cannot be regarded
