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XVI. THE BUDDHIST THEORY OF COGNITION
Now as to those who speak of the product of the Demonstrant) as unequivocally nondistinct from the Demonstrant, and those who with rejection of external objects say that there is simply a non-duality of cognition, - he states the collapse of their view upon consideration. (129) XVI. Not simultaneous is the existence of fruit and cause;
when the cause has lapsed, there is not a being of the fruit. On the path of non-duality of consciousness there is not consciousness of objects - chopped away and fallen to pieces is the phantasmagoria of the Sugata-Lord).
The Buddhists, of course, hold that from the Demonstrant its fruit is unequivocally nondistinct. And to this effect their tenet: "In both one same cognition is the fruit of the Demon
1) In verse XVI we encounter two main doctrines of dialectical Buddhism, relating to the nature and Validity of knowledge. The first of the two is the more yeneral, asserting that the fruit, i. c. resultant cognition, of the cognizing process is not different from the process itself, that is, is entirely mental. This should, it seems, be taken in connection with the discussions concerning the form lakira), or content, of the cognition. In this form or content something belonging to the object in itself or is it a mental configuration assumed by the cognition in confronting it? The supposition that it is common to both, so that e. g. a blue object is reflected by a blue cognition, is clearly otiose. In regard to this ancient and perennial topic the Buddhists in question decidedly affirmed the view that the form or content is mental and that the validity or truth of the cognition did not consist in a similarity to the object, which they accepted as causing it, but in its reliability in practice. The more precise and subtler considerations coming into the matter will be made apparent in the Jain argumentation here following.
One feature in the Buddhist position discriminates it from what has been sometimes contemplated clsewhere: it is dominated by the main Buddhist doctrine of the momentary or instantaneous (kşanika) nature of all existent things, whereas the problem as stated above seems to be not less reasonable in regard to supposedly durolive entities. This feature brings into this discussion, as will be seen, questions concerning simultaneity and causality.
The second doctrine advances to an extreme idealist position, asserting that the momentary cognitions are the sole existents and that their supposed external objects are mere fictionis.
The two schools of Buddhism are not here identified by name, but there is no difficulty in fixing upon them. In relatively late Sanskrit texts the schools of Buddhist doctrine are commonly reported as four in number, Madhyamika, Yogācārya, Sautrantika and Vaibhāşika; and their leading tenets are stated in a stereotyped manner: see for instance the Sarva-darsana-samgraha of Madhava, c. II (Bauddha-darsana). The second doctrine particularized above is obviously the Vijnana-matra, thought-only", view of the Yogacaryas, known from a mass of original literature and very elaborate studies by modern scholars. That the first doctrine is that of the Sautrāntikas is easily deduced from the fact that that alone of the other three schools figures prominently in the contemporary debates on the problem in question. Reference may be made to the very numerous citations of Sauträntika views and arguments in Stcherbatsky's Buddhist Logic, II. (Index); but that on p. 360. For this reason the Sautrantikas teach that the external) things are the objects of vur cognition, but their (definite, constructed) form is immanent to knowledge', - may suffice for the present purpose. For Jain confutations see Sammati-tarka, pp. 458-463, Prameya. kumula-martuwda, fol. 189.
? Buddha: see also infra, P. 111.
