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142 OUTLINES OF INDIAN PHILOSOPHY believing in Being and the other in non-Being. 'This world, O Kaccăna, generally proceeds on a duality, of the Sitis" and the it is not." But, O Kaccāna, whoever perceives in truth and wisdom how things originate in the world, in his eyes there is no "it is not in this world. Whoever, Kaccāna, perceives in truth and wisdom how things pass away in this world, in his eyes there is no it is in this world.". Neither. Being nor non-Being is the truth according to Buddha, but only Becoming. From this we should not conclude that he denied reality. He did admit it, but only gave a dynamic explanation of it. There is incessant change, but at the same time there is nothing that changes. There is action, but no agent. Language almost fails to give expression to this view, the like of which is known only twice in the history of philosophy-once in Greece. when... Heraklitus taught a generation or two later than Buddha and again in our own time in the philosophy of Bergson, Great indeed should have been the genius that enunciated such a doctrine for the first time.
Since there is incessant production, but ng new things are brought into being, the world becomes the world-process-- 'a continual coming-to-be and passing away.. Neither the world as a whole, nor any object in it, can be described as subject to the process. The process is the thing. The law governing this process is most vital to Buddhism and needs a few words of explanation here, although its enunciation in a general form applicable to whatever is produced belongs to its later history. We may begin by asking the question: If everything is but a series of similar states, what is the relation between any two consecutive members of it? One explanation given in Buddha's time of the fact of such succession was that it was accidental (p. 103). Another, though recognizing a causal relation as underlying the succession, introduced Lin explaining it a supernatural element like God in addition to known factors (p. 104). In neither case could man effectively interfere with the course of things. Buddha discarded both these explanations alike and postulated necessity as the sole governing factor. In denying chance, he took his stand on the
1 Oldenberg: op. cit., p. 249.
