goes far, lying it goes everywhere.  Thinking the soul as unbodily among bodies, firm among fleeting things, the wise man casts off all grief.  The soul cannot be gained by eloquence, by understanding, or by learning.  It can be obtained by him alone whom it chooses.  To him it reveals its own nature [Footnote ref 1].”  So long as the Self identifies itself with its desires, he wills and acts according to them and reaps the fruits in the present and in future lives.  But when he comes to know the highest truth about himself, that he is the highest essence and principle of the universe, the immortal and the infinite, he ceases to have desires, and receding from all desires realizes the ultimate truth of himself in his own infinitude.  Man is as it were the epitome of the universe and he holds within himself the fine constituents of the gross body (annamaya ko@sa), the vital functions (pra@namaya ko@sa) of life, the will and desire (manomaya) and the thoughts and ideas (vijnanamaya), and so long as he keeps himself in these spheres and passes through a series of experiences in the present life and in other lives to come, these experiences are willed by him and in that sense created by him.  He suffers pleasures and pains, disease and death.  But if he retires from these into his true unchangeable being, he is in a state where he is one with his experience and there is no change and no movement.  What this state is cannot be explained by the use of concepts.  One could only indicate it by pointing out that it is not any of those concepts found in ordinary knowledge; it is not

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[Footnote 1:  Ka@tha II.  The translation is not continuous.  There are some parts in the extract which may be differently interpreted.]

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whatever one knows as this and this (neti neti).  In this infinite and true self there is no difference, no diversity, no meum and tuum.  It is like an ocean in which all our phenomenal existence will dissolve like salt in water.  “Just as a lump of salt when put in water will disappear in it and it cannot be taken out separately but in whatever portion of water we taste we find the salt, so, Maitreyi, does this great reality infinite and limitless consisting only of pure intelligence manifesting itself in all these (phenomenal existences) vanish in them and there is then no phenomenal knowledge” (B@rh.  II. 4. 12).  The true self manifests itself in all the processes of our phenomenal existences, but ultimately when it retires back to itself, it can no longer be found in them.  It is a state of absolute infinitude of pure intelligence, pure being, and pure blessedness.

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CHAPTER IV

GENERAL OBSERVATIONS ON THE SYSTEMS OF INDIAN PHILOSOPHY

In what Sense is a History of Indian Philosophy possible?