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VEDÂNTA-SÚTRAS.
idea of oneness due to the perception of similarity residing in different things perceived at different times, you neces. sarily must acknowledge oneness on the part of the cognising subject. In the case of the flame there is a valid means of knowledge to prove that there really is a succession of similar flames, but in the case of the jar, we are not aware of such a means, and we therefore have no right to assume that recognition is due to the similarity of many successive jars.--Perhaps you will here argue as follows. The momentariness of jars and the like is proved by Perception as well as Inference. Perception in the first place presents as its object the present thing which is different from nonpresent things, in the same way as it presents the blue thing as different from the yellow; it is in this way that we know the difference of the present thing from the past and the future. Inference again proceeds as follows-jars and the like are momentary because they produce effects and have existence (sattva); what is non-momentary, such as the horn of a hare, does not produce effects and does not possess existence. We therefore conclude from the existence of the last momentary jar that the preceding jar-existences also are perishable, just because they are momentary existences like the existence of the last jar,But both this perception and this inference have already been disproved by what was said above about the impossibility of momentary existences standing to one another in the relation of cause and effect. Moreover, that difference of the present object from the non-present object which is intimated by Perception does not prove the present object to be a different thing (from the past object of Perception), but merely its being connected with the present time. This does not prove it to be a different thing, for the same thing can be connected with different times. The two reasons again which were said to prove the momentariness of jars are invalid because they may be made to prove just the contrary of what they are alleged to prove. For we may argue as follows–From existence and from their having effects it follows that jars, and so on, are permanent; for whatever is non-permanent, is non-existent, and does
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