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I ADHYAYA, I PÅDA, 4.
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then, through its own essential nature, qualities, power and energies, imparts to those souls bliss infinite and unsurpassable. When now the question arises—as it must arise, as to how this Brahman is to be attained, there step in certain other Vedanta-texts - such as 'He who knows Brahman reaches the highest' (Bri. Up. II, 1, 1), and 'Let a man meditate on the Self as his world' (Bri. Up. I, 4, 15) —and, by means of terms denoting 'knowing' and so on, enjoin meditation as the means of attaining Brahman. (We may illustrate this relation existing between the texts setting forth the nature of Brahman and those enjoining meditation by two comparisons.) The case is like that of a man who has been told .There is a treasure hidden in your house.' He learns through this sentence the existence of the treasure, is satisfied, and then takes active steps to find it and make it his own.—Or take the case of a young prince who, intent on some boyish play, leaves his father's palace and, losing his way, does not return. The king thinks his son is lost; the boy himself is received by some good Brahman who brings him up and teaches him without knowing who the boy's father is. When the boy has reached his sixteenth year and is accomplished in every way, some fully trustworthy person tells him, 'Your father is the ruler of all these lands, famous for the possession of all noble qualities, wisdom, generosity, kindness, courage, valour and so on, and he stays in his capital, longing to see you, his lost child. Hearing that his father is alive and a man so high and noble, the boy's heart is filled with supreme joy ; and the king also, understanding that his son is alive, in good health, handsome and well instructed, considers himself to have attained all a man can wish for. He then takes steps to recover his son, and finally the two are reunited.
The assertion again that a statement referring to some accomplished thing gratifies men merely by imparting a knowledge of the thing, without being a means of knowledge with regard to its real existence—so that it would be comparable to the tales we tell to children and sick people, can in no way be upheld. When it is ascertained that a thing has no real existence, the mere knowledge or idea
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