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III. X111]
CRITICISM OF THE BUDDHIST AVIDYA
211
nothing but identical cognition'. But the Buddhist may argue that the truth of the identity of cognition is established by means of abolition of the difference between the content and the cognition, because an identical cognition is incompatible with the numerical difference of contents. Thus in every cognition the content is cognized together with the cognition. And the cognition is as much a content of itself as the content is supposed to be. This necessary compresence of the contents in the same cognition is not intelligible without their identity. The felt difference must then be an illusion. The Jaina avers that the necessity of compresence of two or more contents in one cognition proves neither the identity of the contents inter se nor the identity of the contents with the cognition. Thus a substance and its qualities are always perceived together, but this identity of perception does not annul the difference of the contents, nor the difference of the cognition from them. Nor is it our conviction that when many things such as the chair and the table and the other furniture in a room are perceived together, their mutual differences are abolished. But if this association be regarded as accidental, the example of substance and quality will rebut all doubt of falsity of inference. The subjectivist himself admits that the omniscient Buddha cognizes all the different consciousnesscentres (which appear as so many subjects). But he does not conclude that all the different subjective centres are really identical with the Buddha.2 Moreover, we do not find any logical absurdity in the supposition that things may be perceived together and yet be different from one another. Thus, for instance, when any object is seen, it is seen together with light. There can be no visual perception possible for us in darkness. But nobody will conclude from this that light and the jar or the pen are identical. It is quite possible to argue that the relation between cognition and its content is one of illuminer and illumined. And that they are felt together is due to the fact that without the cognition of the one the other cannot be cognized. In other words, the relation may be one of means and end, condition and conditional. The argument of the Buddhist is the prototype of the argument of the Vedāntist which we have considered before. The Vedāntist has argued from the coincidence of the content and cognition to their necessary identity and integration. We have shown that the Jaina explains this by asserting the relation to be one of identity-indifference. The same conclusion will follow from the Buddhist argument of necessary compresence.
Let us now address ourselves to the examination of the nihilist's
1 Cf. dravya paryāyau hi Jainänām eka-mati-jñāna-grähyau, na ca sarvathai 'katvam pratipadyete-Ibid., p. 243.
2 tathā Yogācārasyā 'pi sakala-vijñāna-paramāņavaḥ Sugatajñanenai 'kena grähyāḥ, na cai 'katvabhājaḥ-Ibid.
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