Reading section 22

If you bring forward as an antagonistic syllogism, "The mountains, &c., cannot have had a maker, from the fact that they were not produced by a body, just as is the case with the eternal ether,"--this pretended inference will no more stand examination than the young fawn can stand the attack of the full-grown lion; for the additional words "by a body" are useless, since "from the fact that they were not produced" would be a sufficient middle term by itself [and the argument thus involves the fallacy called _vyápyatvásiddhi_].[239] Nor can you retort, "Well, let this then be our middle term;" for you cannot establish it as a real fact. Nor again is it possible to raise the smallest shadow of a fear lest our middle term should be liable to limitation by any suggested condition (_upádhi_),[240] [such as "the being produced by a corporeal agent," to limit our old reason "from having the nature of effects"], because we have on our side a valid line of argument to establish our view, viz., "If the mountains, &c., had no maker, then they would not be effects" [but all do acknowledge that they have the nature of effects], for in this world that is not an effect which can attain its proper nature independently of any series of concurrent causes. And this series inevitably involves the idea of some sort of maker; and I mean by "being a maker" the being possessed of that combination of volition, desire to act, and knowledge of the proper means, which sets in motion all other causes, but is itself set in motion by none. And hence we hold that if the necessity of a maker were overthrown, the necessity of the action of all the other causes would be simultaneously overthrown, since these are dependent thereon; and this would lead to the monstrous doctrine that effects could be produced without any cause at all. There is a rule laid down by Sankara-kinkara which applies directly to the present case--

"When a middle term is accompanied by a sound argument to establish its validity,

"Then you cannot attempt to supply a limiting condition on account of the [supposed] non-invariable concomitance of the major term."

If you maintain that there are many sound counter-arguments, such as "If the Supreme Being were a maker, He would be possessed of a body," &c., we reply, that all such reasoning is equally inconsistent, whether we allow that Supreme Being's existence to be established or not.[241]

As has been said by Udayana Áchárya [in the Kusumáñjali, iii. 5]--

"If Sruti, &c., have any authority, your negative argument fails from being precluded; if they are fallacious, our old objection of a 'baseless inference' returns stronger than ever."

Nor need we fear the possibility of any other contradiction to our argument, since it would be overthrown by either alternative of God's being known or unknown.[242]

"Well, let all this be granted; but the activity of God in creating the world, what end did it have in view? His own advantage or some other being's? If it was for the former end, was it in order to attain something desired, or to avoid something not desired? It could not be the first, because this would be quite incongruous in a being who possesses every possible desire gratified; and for the same reason too it could not be the second. If it was for the latter end [the advantage of another] it would be equally incongruous; for who would call that being "wise" who busied himself in acting for another? If you replied that His activity was justified by compassion, any one would at once retort that this feeling of compassion should have rather induced Him to create all living beings happy, and not checkered with misery, since this militates against His compassion; for we define compassion as the disinterested wish to avoid causing another pain. Hence we conclude that it is not befitting for God to create the world." This has been said by Bhattáchárya--

"Not even a fool acts without some object in view;

"Suppose that God did not create the world, what end would be left undone by Him?"--

We reply, O thou crest-jewel of the atheistic school, be pleased for a moment to close thy envy-dimmed eyes, and to consider the following suggestions. His action in creation is indeed solely caused by compassion; but the idea of a creation which shall consist only of happiness is inconsistent with the nature of things, since there cannot but arise eventual differences from the different results which will ripen from the good or evil actions of the beings who are to be created. Nor need you object that this would interfere with God's own independence [as He would thus seem to depend on others' actions], since there is the well-known saying, "One's own body does not hinder one;" nay rather it helps to carry out one's aims;[243] and for this there is authority in such passages of the Veda as that (in the Svetásvatara Upanishad, iii. 2), "There is one Rudra only; he admits[244] not of a second," &c. "But then how will you remedy your deadly sickness of reasoning in a circle? [for you have to prove the Veda by the authority of God, and then again you have to prove God's existence by the Veda"]. We reply, that we defy you to point out any reasoning in a circle in our argument. Do you suspect this "reciprocal dependence of each," which you call "reasoning in a circle," in regard to their being produced or in regard to their being known?[245] It cannot be the former, for though the production of the Veda is dependent on God, still as God Himself is eternal, there is no possibility of _His_ being produced; nor can it be in regard to their being known, for even if our knowledge of God were dependent on the Veda, the Veda might be learned from some other source; nor, again, can it be in regard to the knowledge of the non-eternity of the Veda, for the non-eternity of the Veda is easily perceived by any _yogin_ endowed with the transcendent faculties (_tívra_,[246] &c.)

Therefore, when God has been rendered propitious by the performance of duties which produce His favour, the desired end, Liberation, is obtained; thus everything is clear.

E. B. C.

* * * * *

NOTE ON PAGES 172, 173.

We have here an exemplification of the five fallacies or _hetvábhásas_ of the modern Hindu logic (cf. _Siddhántamukt._, § 71, _Tarkasamgr._, 55-67), viz., _anaikánta_, _viruddha_, _asiddha_, _kálátyayopadishta_ or _bádhita_, and _pratipakshita_ or _sat-pratipaksha_. The four first of these generally correspond to the _savyabhichára_ or "erratic," _viruddha_ or "contradictory," _sádhyasama_ or "unproved," and _atítakála_ or "mistimed," _i.e._, "precluded," as given in the list of fallacies of the older logic in p. 164; but _pratipakshita_ corresponds imperfectly to _prakaranasama_. The _prakaranasama_ or "uncertain" reason is properly that reason which is equally available for both sides, as, _e.g._, the argument, "Sound is eternal because it is audible," which could be met by the equally plausible argument, "Sound is non-eternal because it is audible;" or, according to other authorities, it is that reason which itself raises the same difficulties as the original question, as, _e.g._, "sound is non-eternal because eternal qualities are not perceived in it;" here this alleged reason is as much the subject of dispute as the old question, "Is sound eternal?" But the _pratipakshita_ reason is one which is counter-balanced by an equally valid reason, as "Sound is eternal because it is audible," and "Sound is non-eternal because it is a product."

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 205: Cf. Nyáya Sútras, i. 29.]

[Footnote 206: In p. 112, line 16, of the Calcutta edition, I read _doshanimitta-tattva_ for _doshanimittakatva_ (compare Nyáya Sút. iv. 68).]

[Footnote 207: Without this last clause the definition might include the objects (_vishaya_), as these are, of course, connected with right knowledge.]

[Footnote 208: Ísvara is a cause of right knowledge (_pramána_) according to the definition, because he is _pramáyá ásrayah_.]

[Footnote 209: On this compare Siddhánta-Muktávali, p. 115.]

[Footnote 210: On these compare my note to Colebrooke's Essays, vol. i. p. 315.]

[Footnote 211: "Our coming to the conclusion that there can be no smoke in the hill if there be no fire, while we _see_ the smoke, is the confutation of there being no fire in the hill" (_Ballantyne_). Or, in other words, "the mountain must have the absence-of-smoke (_vyápaka_) if it has the absence-of-fire (the false _vyápya_").]

[Footnote 212: Action (_pravritti_) follows after the ascertainment of the truth by _nyáya_.]

[Footnote 213: Cp. Vátsyáyana's Comment., p. 6. The Calcutta edition reads _prakírtitá_ for _paríkshitá_.]

[Footnote 214: The printed text omits the third fault, "a stupid indifference, _moha_," which is however referred to presently.]

[Footnote 215: In p. 116, line 3, I would read _tannirvartakam_ for _tannivartakam_.]

[Footnote 216: This refers to the couplet so often quoted in Hindu authors, "Logic, the three Vedas, trade and agriculture, and the eternal doctrine of polity,--these four sciences are the causes of the stability of the world" (cf. Manu, vii. 43). It occurs in Kámandaki's _Nítisára_, ii. 2, and seems to be referred to in Vátsyáyana's Com. p. 3, from which Mádhava is here borrowing.]

[Footnote 217: Compare the English proverb, "As soon as the cat can lick her ear."]

[Footnote 218: Literally the "bell-road," _i.e._, "the chief road through a village, or that by which elephants, &c., decorated with tinkling ornaments, proceed."--_Wilson's Dict._]

[Footnote 219: The cognition is produced in the first moment, remains during the second, and ceases in the third.]

[Footnote 220: See Nyáya Sút. i. 2.]

[Footnote 221: As otherwise why should we require liberation at all? Or rather the author probably assumes that other Naiyáyikas have sufficiently established this point against its opponents, cf. p. 167, line 11.]

[Footnote 222: See _supra_, pp. 24-32.]

[Footnote 223: All is momentary, all is pain, all is _sui generis_, all is unreal.]

[Footnote 224: In the form of the various _klesas_ or "afflictions."]

[Footnote 225: _Ávarana_, cf. pp. 55, 58.]

[Footnote 226: But the Nyáya holds that the attributes of the soul, as happiness, desire, aversion, &c., are perceived by the internal sense, mind (Bháshá P. § 83).]

[Footnote 227: The reading _múrtapratibandhát_ is difficult, but I believe that _pratibandha_ means here _vyápti_, as it does in Sánkhya Sútras, i. 100.]

[Footnote 228: The true _summum bonum_ must be _niratisaya_,--incapable of being added to.]

[Footnote 229: _Yogyánupalabdhi_ is when an object is not seen, and yet all the usual concurrent causes of vision are present, as the eye, light, &c.]

[Footnote 230: Alluding to the Vedic phrase, "_grávánah plavanti_," see Uttara Naishadha, xvii. 37. The phrase _asmánah plavanti_ occurs in Shadv. Br. 5, 12.]

[Footnote 231: Or perhaps "capable of being surpassed."]

[Footnote 232: Since the Supreme Being is a single instance.]

[Footnote 233: Since the Veda, if non-eternal, must [to be authoritative] have been created by God, and yet it is brought forward to reveal the existence of God.]

[Footnote 234: The Nyáya holds presumption to be included under inference, and comparison is declared to be the ascertaining the relation of a name to the thing named.]

[Footnote 235: Since ether is connected by contact with the parts of everything, as _e.g._, a jar.]

[Footnote 236: The whole (as the jar) resides by intimate relation in its parts (as the jar's two halves). But the eternal substances, ether, time, the soul, mind, and the atoms of earth, water, fire, and air, do not thus reside in anything, although, of course, the category _visesha_ does reside in them by intimate relation. The word "substances" excludes _tantutva_, and "existing in intimate relation" excludes ether, &c.]

[Footnote 237: Intermediate between infinite and infinitesimal, all eternal substances being the one or the other.]

[Footnote 238: The _viruddha-hetu_ is that which is never found where the major term is.]

[Footnote 239: This and much more of the whole discussion is taken from the Kusumáñjali, v. 2, and I extract my note on the passage there. "The older Naiyáyikas maintained that the argument 'the mountain has fire because it has blue smoke,' involved the fallacy of vyápyatvásiddhi, because the alleged middle term was unnecessarily restricted (see Siddhánta Muktáv. p. 77). The moderns, however, more wisely consider it as a harmless error, and they would rather meet the objection by asserting that there is no proof to establish the validity of the assumed middle term."]

[Footnote 240: For the _upádhi_ cf. pp. 7, 8.]

[Footnote 241: As in the former case it would be clear that it is a subject for separate discussion; and in the latter you would be liable to the fault of _ásrayásiddhi_, a "baseless inference," since your subject (or minor term), being itself non-existent, cannot be the locus or subject of a negation (cf. Kusumáñjali, iii. 2). "Just as that subject from which a given attribute is excluded cannot be unreal, so neither can an unreal thing be the subject of a negation."]

[Footnote 242: If God is known, then His existence must be granted; if He is not known, how can we argue about Him? I read lines 15, 16, in p. 120 of the Calcutta edition, _vikalpaparáhatatvát_, and then begin the next clause with _syád etat_. The printed text, _vikalpaparáhatah syát tad etat_, seems unintelligible.]

[Footnote 243: The aggregate of the various subtile bodies constitutes Hiranyagarbha, or the supreme soul viewed in His relation to the world as creator, while the aggregate of the gross bodies similarly constitutes his gross body (viráj).]

[Footnote 244: The usual reading is _tasthur_ for _tasthe_.]

[Footnote 245: For these divisions of the _anyonyásraya_ fallacy, see _Nyáyasútra vritti_, i. 39 (p. 33).]

[Footnote 246: For _tívra_ cf. _Yoga sútras_, i. 21, 22.]

CHAPTER XII.