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324 OUTLINES OF INDIAN PHILOSOPHY for such change to take place comes from the past karma of the selves that are on life's pilgrimage at the time. This means the abolition of the idea of God' from the system, which is indeed a strange tenet to be held by a school claiming to be orthodox par excellence. To characterize the whole view in one word, it is pure empiricism excepting only in one point, viz. the recognition of a supernatural sphere of being and of a revealed authority through which a knowledge of it can be attained. As regards the other sphere-that of common experience-it beats every naturalistic school of thought known to history. In fact, a standing charge against the Mimāṁsā, at least in one stage of its growth, was that it was thoroughly materialistic in its outlook.3
The Mimāṁsaka is also a pluralist and believes that variety is at the root of the physical universe. The school of Kumarila accepts all the nine dravyas known to the NyāyaVaiseșika and its conception of them is more or less the same. It adds two more to them, viz. tamas or darkness' and Sabda or 'sound.'s Time is perceivable, the view being that all perceptual experience, no matter through what sense it is acquired, includes a reference to this element. It cannot, however, be apprehended by itself, but only along with some other object. Other dravyas also are regarded as perceivable excepting only the manas which is known mediately. It is curious that darkness should be regarded as a positive dravya in preference to the Nyāya-Vaiseşika view, which is also Prabhākara's, of equating it with the absence of light. The reason assigned, viz. that it is characterized by colour and movement which can only be found in dravyas, is too naïve to appeal to anyone. Salikanātha describes it as 'crude.' The statement that it cannot be negation (abhāva), since its supposed correlate (pratiyogin),
The gods of Indian mythology also are repudiated, and sacrificial offerings, it is explained, are made as if there were gods. See p. 36 ante.
Cf. Yatha samdrsyate tatha: SV. p. 552, st. 29. 3 SV. p. 4, st. 10.
Cf. Vilaksana-svabhāvatvāt bhāvānām. SD. P. 102. 5 Māna-meyodaya, p. 66.
6 SD. PP. 45-6. 7 Mäna-meyodaya, PP. 78-80. 8 PP. pp. 144 ff.; Māna-meyodaya, p. 68.
