________________
612
TATTVASANGRAHA : CHAPTER XVI.
idea in another's mind, and in reality the Apoha in the form of Reflection is nothing different from Idea (Cognition): so that as between the Speaker and the Listener, what would be know as the subject of Convention could not be known to the other; hence wherein could the Convention be made or comprehended ? Unless the Speaker kmows the thing, he cannot make any Convention relating to it; nor can the Listener comprehend it. If he did, it would lead to absurdities. For instance, the Reflection of the object, which is what the Speaker cognises as figuring in his cognition, is not cognised by the Listener; and what is cognised by the Listener is not cognised by the Speaker ; as every man is cognisant only of what appears to liimself.
"The futility of Convention is next shown-'What too, etc. etc.The Reflection that was apprehended at the time of the making of the Convention, by the Listener or by the Speaker, is not apprehended at the time of the use of the word; as the former, being in a perpetual flux, luas long ceased to existence; and that which is apprehended at the time of the 18e of the word was not seen at the time of the making of the Convention ; as what was apprehended at that time was something entirely different. And it is not right that usage should be based upon a Convention that rests upon something different, as such usage would lead to absurdities." (1208-1209)
This argument is answered in the following--
TEXT (1210).
EVEN THOUGH HACH PERSON IS COGNISANT OF WHAT APPEARS TO HIM - SELF, YET THERE IS SOMETHING IN THE COGNITION OF EXTERNAL
THINGS WHICH IS COMMON TO BOTH PERSONS.—(1210)
COMMENTARY.
As a matter of fact, the form of the cognition also is not accepted by us to be denoted by words,-in view of which the impossibility of Conventions relating to that could be reasonably urged against us. Because, for us. all verbal usage is purely illusory, being assumed in accordance with the notions of individual persons,-it is as illusory and false as the idea of two moons that appears in the man of disordered vision; all that is produced by words is a Conceptual Content relating to the Thing, through the arousing of the Impressions of objectless conceptions; and it is the Reflection of this that is called the Denotation of words, because it is produced by words, not because they are denoted (expressed) by them. So that though, in peality, the Speaker and the Listener are cognisant of what appears in their own consciousness, yet inasmuch as the root of illusion is equally present in both men, just as in the case of the man with the disordered visionthe apprehension that the two men have of the external object is similar; and yet the idea in the mind of the Speaker is that the thing that I cognise is also cognised by this man'; the Listener also has the same idea.It might be asked-How is the fact of both of them apprehending the same thing known to each of them 1-The answer to that is that in reality it
