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SANKHYA-YOGA
273 petual movement in praksti is to be found in the conviction that if it ceased to be dynamic at any stage, it would be impossible to account for the reappearance of motion in it again. Here we see a realization of the truth of Newton's First Law of Motion that a body in motion or at rest continues to be so unless it is disturbed from outside. There is no such external agency recognized in the doctrine to interfere with its movement. No doubt the change from the state of dissolution to that of evolution is accounted for by introducing an outside influence, viz. the presence of spirit (puruşa-samnidhi)"; but the explanation is given only in a half-hearted manner and is, as we shall see, one of the unsatisfactory features of the system, so far at least as the Sankhya part of it is concerned.
There are certain special features of evolution as conceived here which deserve notice. First, it is based on a belief in the indestructibility of matter and the persistence of force. Something cannot come out of nothing; and whatever is, has always been. Production is only the manifestation (abhivyakti) of what is already in a latent form, and is not a new creation (ārambha). The so-called beginning of an object is only an event in its history; the object itself is not, and cannot be, made. Similarly, destruction means only change of form, for there can be nothing like absolute annihilation. Secondly, evolution is conceived as cyclic...or periodical. That is, there are periods of evolution and dissolution alternating so that it is not a process of continuous progress in one direction only. It would seem also that dissolution is the normal state, for there is a persistent tendency in praksti when in evolution, to revert to that state. Next, evolution is here regarded as teleological; but, as praksti is by hypothesis not sentient, we cannot take it wholly so. We may characterize it as quasi-teleological, however hard it may be to understand that term. What is meant is that the whole process serves a purpose, though it cannot be described as consciously pursued. Lastly evolution, so far as it is teleologicat at air, has reference to the individual and not to the species. Its object is not the elevation or improvement of
1 SP. i. 96.
