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VEDANTA-SUTRAS.
superimposes itself on the crystal near it,-and thus consider the soul to be an 'I' and an enjoyer. Fruition thus results from ignorance, and release from knowledge of the truth. This their theory the Sânkhyas prove by means of perception, inference, and authoritative tradition. Now with regard to those matters which are proved by perception, we Vedantins have no very special reason for dissenting from the Sânkhyas; and what they say about their authoritative tradition, claiming to be founded on the knowledge of all-knowing persons such as Kapila, has been pretty well disproved by us in the first adhyaya. If, now, we further manage to refute the inference which leads them to assume the Pradhâna as the cause of the world, we shall have disestablished their whole theory. We therefore proceed to give this refutation.
On this point the Sânkhyas reason as follows. It must necessarily be admitted that the entire world has one cause only; for if effects were assumed to originate from several causes we should never arrive at an ultimate cause. Assume that parts such as e. g. threads produce a whole (i. e. in the case of threads, a piece of cloth) in the way of their being joined together by means of their six sides, which are parts of the threads. You must then further assume that the threads themselves are in the same way produced by their parts, having a similar constitution. And these parts again by their parts, until you reach the atoms; these also must be assumed to produce their immediate effects by being joined together with their six sides, for otherwise solid extension (prathiman) could not be brought about. And then the atoms also as being wholes, consisting of parts', must be viewed as produced by their parts, and these again by their parts and so on, so that we never arrive at an ultimate cause. In order therefore to establish such an ultimate cause we must have recourse to the hypothesis of the general cause being constituted by one substance, which possesses the power of transforming itself in various different ways, without at the
1 As follows from their having six sides.
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