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274 Controversy between Dualists and Monists [CH. may be an inference of negation of knowledge and not of positive ignorance. For one may well infer that, since he existed and during the interval between the two waking stages had a state of mind, that state must have been a state of absence of knowledge. The apperception cannot be said to be mere memory; for memory can only be through root-impressions. The intuition of the sākṣi-consciousness being eternal, no root-impression can be produced by such knowledge; for the mechanism of root-impressions is only a psychological device for producing memory by such cognitions as are transitory. To this Madhusūdana's reply is that the apperception under discussion cannot be called an inference; for the inference is based on the ground that the sleeper had a mental state during the dreamless condition. But, if he had no knowledge at the time, it is impossible for him to say that he was at that time endowed with any specific mental state. It also cannot be said that negation of knowledge during dreamless sleep can be inferred from the fact that at that time there was no cause for the production of knowledge; for the absence of such cause can be known only from the absence of knowledge (and vice versa), and this involves a vicious circle. Nor can it be said that absence of cause of knowledge can be inferred from the blissful condition of the senses, which could happen only as a consequence of the cessation of their operation; for there is no evidence that the cessation of the operation of the senses would produce the blissful condition. It must be noted in this connection that intuition of ajñāna is always associated with absence of knowledge; so that in every case where there is an intuition of ajñāna the inference of absence of knowledge would be valid. The so-called non-perception is really an inference from positive ajñāna; thus, when one has perceived in the morning an empty yard, he can infer from the absence of the knowledge of an elephant in it the fact of his positive ignorance of an elephant there. Thus the apperception of absence of knowledge can be explained as inference. It can also be explained as a case of memory. The objection that the intuition of ajñāna cannot have any rootimpression is also invalid; for the ajñāna which is the object of the sākṣi-consciousness during dreamless sleep is itself a reflection through a vrtti of ajñāna, since it is only under such conditions that ajñāna can be an object of sākṣi-consciousness. Since a vrtti is admitted in the intuition of ajñāna, with the cessation of the ortti
