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Numerical Difference and Absolute Non-Existence
is no contradiction, as identity quâ substance and difference quâ modes are attested by indubitable experience. The contradiction would be insuperable if both identity and difference quâ substance were maintained. But the Jaina never does this. It is a pity that rival philosophers, instead of profiting by the wisdom of the Jaina philosopher, have maligned him without trying to understand his real import. The Jaina is reproached with maintaining that cause and effect are identical in the same reference and in all its implications. He is criticized on the ground of advocating the identity and difference of the cause and effect both as substance. But this has never been done by the Jaina and so the criticism is based upon a hasty interpretation. The philosophers have been hasty in their interpretation of reality and also in their interpretation of the Jaina view.
We began the present chapter with the consideration of the reality of numerical difference and this led us to the consideration of relations. We endeavoured to establish that the reality of these concepts is to be admitted on pain of absurdities. And once their reality is conceded the multiple nature of reals follows with irresistible logic. Incidentally we dealt with the problem of causation and gave the views of the Masters on the supposed antinomies. If the discussion of these problems, which raised themselves in connection with the enquiry into the reality of negation, be looked upon as a digression, our apology is that it was neither irrelevant nor unnecessary. The problems of philosophy are inter-connected and our understanding of one makes the examination of others necessary. The central thesis of the Jaina is that there is not only diversity of reals, but each real is equally diversified. Diversification as induced by relations has been explained. The conclusion is legitimate that each real is possessed of an infinite number of modes at every moment. The number of reals is infinite and consequently their relations with one another are infinite. We have shown that all things are related in one way or the other and that relations induce relational qualities in the relata, which accordingly become infinitely diversified at each moment and throughout their career, which is unbounded both by past and by future limits. Things are neither momentary nor uniform, which is respectively the position of the fluxist and of the Vedantist. A real changes every
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