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APPENDIX II COSMOGONY, COSMOLOGY, ASTRONOMY
COSMOGONY The world is infinite. All the magnitudes (ustikūyus) in it may change their forms or their conditions ; but none of them can be destroyed.
The world was never created at any particular moment. It is subject to integration and dissolution. Its constituent elements—the six substances, or five magnitudes together with the soul-are the soul, matter, time, space, and the principles of motion and stationariness. These are eternal and indestructible: but their conditions change constantly.
This change takes place in the two eras (cusurpinī and utsarpiņī. But this division of time does not apply to the whole universe; it exists only in Arya-khanda of the Bhārata and Airārata kshetrus (regions).
COSMOLOGY The universe, or the loka, i.e. all space except the beyond (aloku or non-loku), has the form exhibited on the following page.
The total volume is 343 cubic rajjus (rujju = a certain, inconceivably great, measure of length), as may be calculated from the dimensions given on the map.
The cosmos (loka) is 14 rujjus high (HT), 7 rajjus from north to south, and 7 from east to west (EW). But from east to west it tapers up till at the height of 7 rajjus, i.e. the middle of the universe, it is only 1 rajju wide, like the waist of the akimbo headless figure in the diagram (MD). From here it again
