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SAMAYASARA
necessarily demands complete escape from such an error. Otherwise it is not possible to realise the true nature of the Self which is the ultimate object of all philosophical and religious discipline. "In spite of this it is on the part of man a natural procedure which has its cause in wrong knowledge—not to distinguish the two entities (object and subject) and their respective attributes, although they are absolutely distinct, but to superimpose upon each the characteristic nature and the attributes of the other, and thus coupling the Rcal and Unreal, to make use of thc cxpicssions such as “That I am'. "That is mine'.”
The second point which he brings out in the introduction is the distinction between the two points of view, Vyavahara and Paramarthic, practical point of view and the absolute point of view. The confusion of attributes referred to above is brought about by Nescience or Avidya. The discriminating knowledge of the true nature of the Self is therefore to be obtained by the opposite Vidya or knowledge. He maintains that the concrete life in this world is vitiated by Nescience and is real only from the practical point of view. "The mutual superimposition of the Self and the Non-Self, which is termed Nescience, is the presupposition on which there base all pračtical distinction—those made in ordinary life as well as those laid down by the Veda-between means of knowledge, objects of knowledge and all scriptural texts, whether they are concerned with injunctions and prohibition (of meritorious and non-meritorious actions) or with final release.". Thus he points out that in ordinary life, cvery individual has to operate only through his body and sense without which life itself would be impossible in the concrete world. Even the cognitive process of knowledge depends upon sense perception and intellectual activity which naturally presupposes the organic body. Even when the individual is looked upon as an agent carrying out the injunctions religious and ethical an organic body must be presupposed for carrying out all those injunctions. His conduct as the social being in the world is therefore inextricably mixed up with bodily behaviour, without which he can neither discharge his duties as a social being nor as a religious devotee. In this respect he is of common nature with other
