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THE JAINA GAZETTE.
festation of a being whose nature it is to continue conscious after death? Such a being could not naturally think Otherwise. How comes, it then, that Mr. Spencer does think otherwise? The answer is in the theory of karma, there is some karma, in this case false argument, disturbing the soul's natural thought. That this natural thought is only obscured and still persists in spite of the arguments, is shown by the doubt expressed in saying we 'seem' obliged to relinquish it, and by the rising up of feelings of strangeness and repugnance at the suggestion that the soul should give up its own natural belief which was held before the intellect disturbed it. We may say, then, that the thought which Mr. Spencer proposes to relinquish is itself fair evidence of the existence of soul.
Why we cannot work the argument the other way and say that the thought that consciousness ceases at death is a manifestation of a being whose nature it is to cease to exist, I am afraid I must leave to the reader to decide for himself. Possibly the judgment of a calm mind is the only criterion as to which of two conflicting propositions is true. With the right thought there will be harmony all through the whole being; it will not clash with either the feelings or the will; it will be felt to be true, and will be chosen in the conduct of life.
The second way in which Mr. Spencer's own statements practically prove the existence of soul is seen in the final paragraph of the quoted extract. If the elements of consciousness are derived as he says from an Infinite and Eternal Energy, what is the condition of this Energy after these elements have as he says lapsed into it? Consciousness cannot consist of unconscious elements, so whatever may be meant by elements of consciousness, they must be instances of being conscious. Obviously, then, the lapsing of these elements into this Infinite and Eternal Energy would still leave it conscious. Now, we cannot think of energy without something possessing the energy, so Mr. Spencer's source of consciousness turns out to be something not different from the Jain philosophy's reality called soul whose nature it is to be conscious, -conscious being.
Shree Sudharmaswami Gyanbhandar-Umara, Surat
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