from consciousness is the third.[1613] In all kinds of consciousness is the fourth creation which flows modification of the third.  This fourth creation comprises Wind and Light and Space and Water and Earth, with their properties of sound, touch, form, taste and scent.  This aggregate of ten arose, without doubt, at the same time.  The fifth creation, O monarch, is that which has arisen from combination of the primal elements (named above).  This comprises the ear, the skin, the eyes, the tongue, and the nose forming the fifth, and speech, and the two hands, and the two legs, and the lower duct, and the organs of generation.  The first five of these constitute the organs of knowledge, and the last five the organs of action.  All these, with mind, arose simultaneously O king.  These constitute the four and twenty topics that exist in the forms of all living creatures.  By understanding these properly, Brahmanas possessed of insight into the truth have never to yield to sorrow.  In the three worlds a combination of these, called body, is possessed by all embodied creatures.  Indeed, O king a combination of those is known as such in deities and men and Danavas, and Yakshas and spirits and Gandharvas and Kinnaras and great snakes, and Charanas and Pisachas, in celestial Rishis and Rakshasas, in biting flies, and worms, and gnats, and vermin born of filth and rats, and dogs and Swapakas and Chaineyas and Chandalas and Pukkasas in elephants and steeds and asses and tigers, and trees and kine.  Whatever other creatures exist in water or space or on earth, for there is no other place in which creatures exist as we have heard, have this combination.  All these, O sire, included within the class called Manifest, are seen to be destroyed day after day.  Hence, all creatures produced by union of these four and twenty are said to be destructible.

“This then is the Indestructible.  And since the universe, which is made up of Manifest and Unmanifest, meet with destruction, therefore, it is said to be Destructible.  The very Being called Mahan who is the eldest-born is always spoken of as an instance of the Destructible.  I have now told thee, O monarch, all that thou hadst asked me.  Transcending the four and twenty topics already adverted to is the twenty-fifth called Vishnu.  That Vishnu in consequence of the absence of all attributes, is not a topic (of knowledge) though as then which pervades all the topics, he has been called so by the wise.  Since that which is destructible has caused all this that is Manifest, therefore, all this is endued with form.  The twenty-fourth, which is Prakriti, is said to preside over all this (which has sprung from her modifications).  The twenty-fifth, which is Vishnu, is formless and, therefore, cannot be said to preside over the universe.[1614] It is that Unmanifest (Prakriti), which, when endued with body (in consequence of union with Chit) dwells in the hearts of all creatures endued with body.  As regards eternal Chetana (the Indestructible), although