are rather entitled to conclude from the circumstance that the various persons (in the sun, the moon, &c.) which constitute a part of the world had been specially mentioned before, that the passage in question is concerned with the whole world in general.  The conjunction ‘or’ (in ‘or he of whom,’ &c.) is meant to exclude the idea of limited makership; so that the whole passage has to be interpreted as follows, ’He who is the maker of those persons forming a part of the world, or rather—­to do away with this limitation—­he of whom this entire world without any exception is the work.’  The special mention made of the persons having been created has for its purpose to show that those persons whom Balaki had proclaimed to be Brahman are not Brahman.  The passage therefore sets forth the maker of the world in a double aspect, at first as the creator of a special part of the world and thereupon as the creator of the whole remaining part of the world; a way of speaking analogous to such every-day forms of expression as, ’The wandering mendicants are to be fed, and then the Brahma/n/as[242].’  And that the maker of the world is the highest Lord is affirmed in all Vedanta-texts.

17.  If it be said that this is not so, on account of the inferential marks of the individual soul and the chief vital air; we reply that that has already been explained.

It remains for us to refute the objection that on account of the inferential marks of the individual soul and the chief vital air, which are met with in the complementary passage, either the one or the other must be meant in the passage under discussion, and not the highest Lord.—­We therefore remark that that objection has already been disposed of under I, 1, 31.  There it was shown that from an interpretation similar to the one here proposed by the purvapakshin there would result a threefold meditation one having Brahman for its object, a second one directed on the individual soul, and a third one connected with the chief vital air.  Now the same result would present itself in our case, and that would be unacceptable as we must infer from the introductory as well as the concluding clauses, that the passage under discussion refers to Brahman.  With reference to the introductory clause this has been already proved; that the concluding passage also refers to Brahman, we infer from the fact of there being stated in it a pre-eminently high reward, ’Warding off all evil he who knows this obtains pre-eminence among all beings, sovereignty, supremacy.’—­But if this is so, the sense of the passage under discussion is already settled by the discussion of the passage about Pratarda/n/a (I, 1, 31); why, then, the present Sutra?—­No, we reply; the sense of our passage is not yet settled, since under I, 1, 31 it has not been proved that the clause, ’Or he whose work is this,’ refers to Brahman.  Hence there arises again, in connexion with the present passage, a doubt whether the individual soul and the chief vital air may not be meant, and that doubt has again to be refuted.—­The word pra/n/a occurs, moreover, in the sense of Brahman, so in the passage, ‘The mind settles down on pra/n/a’ (Ch.  Up.  VI, 8, 2).—­The inferential marks of the individual soul also have, on account of the introductory and concluding clauses referring to Brahman, to be explained so as not to give rise to any discrepancy.