CHAPTER IV.

THE PRELIMINARIES OF THE THIRD AND LAST ANSWER — THE SELF AND THE NOT-SELF.
The second answer remains, as said before, wavering and satisfactionless. Explanation of the world, which is the sole purpose of philosophy, by means of two factors can only be a tentative, and not a final solution. It is a great advance to have reduced the multi- fariousness of the world to a duality. But what the searcher wants is a unity, and in this respect indeed the first answer was even better than the second, for it reduced all things to a unity, the will of an omnipotent being. That unity was, however, a false unity. It had no elements of permanence in it. The will of an individual by itself carries within it no true and satisfactory explanation of the contradictions that make up the world ; it embodies no reason and no safeguard against caprice. Tenure of immortality at the will of another is a mockery and a contradiction in terms, and therefore the Jiva, however reluct- antly, however painfully, has to give up that 18
THE SELF AND THE NOT-SELF. 19
first unity and search for a higher one. In this search his next step leads him, by means of a close examination of the multiplicity which presses on him from all sides, to a duality which seems to him, and indeed is, at the time, the nearest approach to that higher unity that he is seeking.
The forms of this duality, wherein he is centred for the time being, beginning with rough general conceptions of spirit or force and matter, end in the subtlest and most refined ideas of Self and Not- Self.
These, the Self and the Not-Self, are the last two irreducible facts of all consciousness. They cannot be analysed any further. All concrete life, in cognition, desire, and action, begins and ends with these. They are the two simplest constituents of the last result of all philosophical research.
None doubts " am I or am I not." l This has been said over and over again by thinkers of all ages and of all countries. The existence of the Self is certain and indubitable.
The next question about it is : What is it ? Is it black ? is it white ? is it flesh and blood and bone, or nerve and brain, or rocks and
\ Bh&mati. P. 2. (Bib. Ind.) ""
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rivers, mountains, heavenly orbs, or light or heat or force invisible, or time or space ? is it identical with or coextensive with the living body, or is it centred in one limb, organ or point thereof? The single answer to all this questioning is that because "what varies not nor changes in the midst of things that vary and change is different from them,"1 therefore the I-consciousness which persists unchanged and one throughout all the changes of the material body and of all its surroundings is different from them all. ' I ' who played and leaped and slept as an infant in my parent's lap so many years ago have now infants in mine. What unchanged and persistent particle of matter continues throughout these years in my physical organism ? What identity is there between that infantine and this adult bodies of mine ? But the ' I ' has not changed. It is the same. Talking of myself I always name myself ' I,' and nothing more nor less. The sheaths in which I am always enwrapping the ' I ' — thus : I am happy, I am miserable, I am rich, I am poor, I am sick, I am strong, I am young, I am old, I am black, I am white — these are accidents and incidents in the continuity of the ' I.' They are ever passing and varying. The
THE SELF AND THE NOT-SELF. 21
' I ' remains the same. Conditions change, but they always surround the same ' I,' the unchang- ing amid the changing ; and anything that changes is at first instinctively, and later deliberately, rejected from the 'I,' as no part of itself. And as it remains unchanged through the changes of one organism, so it remains unchanged through the changes and multiplicity of all organisms. Ask anyone and everyone in the dark, behind a screen, through closed doorleaves : " Who is it ? " The first impulsive answer is: "It is I." Thus potent is the stamped impress, the unchecked outrush, the irresistible manifestation of the common ' I ' in all beings. The special naming and description : " I am so and so," follows only afterwards, on second thought. So real is the ' I ' to the ' I' that it expects others to recognise it as surely as it recognises itself. Again, what is true of the ' I ' with regard to the body is also true of it with regard to all other things. The house, the town, the country, the earth, the solar system, which ' I ' live in and identify and connect with myself are all changing momentarily ; but ' I ' feel myself persisting unchanged through all their changes. ' I ' am never and can never be conscious of myself having ever been born or of dying, of experiencing a beginning or an end. " In all the endless months, years, and small and
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great cycles, past and to come, this Self-luminous consciousness alone neither arises nor ever sets."1 But as regards all the things other than ' I,' that ' I ' am conscious of, ' I ' am or can become con- scious also of their beginnings and endings, their changes. " Never has the cessation of conscious- ness been experienced, been witnessed directly ; or if it has been, then the witness, the experiencer, himself still remains behind as the continued embodiment of that same consciousness." 2 Thus may we determine what the ' I ' is. " Omnis determinatio est negatio." " All determination is negation " is a well-known and well-established law. We determine, define, delimit, recognise by change, by contrast, by means of opposites ; so much so that even a physical sensation dis- appears entirely if endeavoured to be continued too long without change ; thus we cease to feel the touch of the clothes we put on after a few minutes. And scrutinising closely, the enquirer will find that everything particular, limited,
1 Panehadashi. i. 7.
tffarr
Devt-Bh&gavata. III. xxxii. 15 — 16.
THE SELF AND THE NOT-SELF. 23
changing, must be negated of the ' I ' ; and yet the ' I,' as proved by the direct cognition of all, cannot at all be denied altogether. It is indeed the very foundation of all existence. ' Existence,' ' being ' (using the two words roughly as synony- mous at this stage), means nothing more than ' presence in our consciousness,' ' presence within the cognition of the I, of the Self, of me.' What a thing is, or may be, or must be, entirely apart from us, from the consciousness which is ' I,' of this we simply cannot speak. It may not be within our consciousness in detail and with its specifications, but generally, in some sort or other, it must be so within consciousness, if we are to speak of it at all.
The third step, the immortality of the ' I,' necessarily follows from, is part of, the very nature of the ' I.' What does not change, what is not anything limited, of which we know neither beginning nor end, that is necessarily immortal.
Let us dwell upon these considerations ; let us pause on them till it is perfectly clear to us that our consciousness is the one witness to, the sole evidence and the only possible support and substratum of, all that we regard as real, of all our world. Let us make sure, further, that by eliminating the common factor 'our' from both sides of the equation, the proposition stands,
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and stands confidently, that " consciousness is the only basis and support of the world." For how can we distinguish between ' our ' conscious- ness and ' another's' consciousness, between ' our ' world and ' another's ' world ? That another has a consciousness, that another has a world, that there is another at all, is still only ' our ' consciousness. And as this holds true for every one, at every point, does it not follow that all these 'every ones' are only one, that all these 'our' consciousnesses are only one universal consciousness, which makes all this appearance of mutual intelligence and converse possible ? for it is really only the one talking to itself in different guises. More may be said, later on, in dealing with consciousness from the standpoint of the final explanation of the world-process. In the meanwhile we need not be disturbed by any random statements that " thought (or the ' I '-consciousness) is the product of the brain as much as the bile is the product of the liver." If any earnest-minded student feel himself disturbed by any such, then let him ask himself and the maker of the statement, by what laws of deductive or inductive logic is such statement justified ? If there are many points in common between the liver and the brain, what similarity is there between bile and thought to justify an inference
THE SELF AND THE NOT-SELF. 25
as to the similarity of their causes ? And, again, how do we know that such things as liver and bile and brain are ? Because we see and feel them ! But how are we sure that we see and feel ? Do we see our eyes that see, and touch our hands that touch ? Is it not that we are sure of our seeings and feelings, of our having the senses wherewith we do so, of our existence at all, only becanse we are conscious of such things ? It is far easier to walk on the head comfortably without the aid of arms or legs, than to live and breathe and move and speak without the incessant /^supposition that consciousness is behind and beyond and around everything. Argue as we may, we are always driven back, again and again, inexorably, to the position that consciousness is verily our all in all, the one thing of which we are absolutely sure, which cannot be explained away, and that the pure and universal Self, the one common ' I ' of all creatures, is our last and only refuge.
Perhaps, in our long-practised love of the concrete, we like to tell ourselves that the ' I ' is only a series of separate experiences, separate acts of consciousness. We have then only explained the more intelligible by the less intelligible. The separate experiences, the separate acts of consciousness, are intelligible only by pre- supposing a one continuous consciousness, a D
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self. The acts or modifications are of and belong to the self, not the self to the former. Wherever we see unity, continuity, similarity, there we see the impress of the Self, the One. The concrete is held together only by the abstract. " The Self-born pierced the senses outwards, hence the Jiva seeth the outward (the concrete 'many' and), not the inner Self. One thinker, here and there, turneth his gaze inwards, desirous of immortality, and beholdeth the Pratyag-atma (the abstract Self)." l
We feel impatient, we exclaim : " What is this ' I ' that is neither this nor that ? " Let us define it, if we can, by any particular ' this ' or ' that.' The whole of the world-process has been now endeavouring so to define it, for the whole past half of all time and by the whole half of all countless possible ' this's '; and it has not succeeded. It will go on similarly endeavour- ing to define it in the whole future half of all time and by the remaining half of endless possible ways ; and it will not succeed.2 It
1 Katha. iv. I.
2 The full significance of this statement will appear later, when the distinction between eternity and time, true infinity and the mere boundlessness of space, totality and countless- ness, ^fT^TOWr, kutastha-satta, ' rock-seated being,' and ^r*rrf is understood.
THE SELF AND THE NOT-SELF. 27
has not succeeded and will not succeed because the very being of the ' I ' is the negation, the opposite, of all 'not-I's,' all that is object, all that can be cognised by T as a knowable object, all that is particular, limited, defined, all that can be pointed to as a ' this.' Do we think that we will evade this inevitable conclusion by denying the ' I ' altogether ? We cannot do that, as already said. We will only stultify ourselves. ' I ' is not nothing, but it is not any-one-thing. Let us ponder deeply on this for days and days and weeks and months and years if necessary, till we see the pure, unique, universal, and abstract being of the ' I.' We will do so if we are in earnest with our search ; and when we have done so more than half the battle is won. We have attained to the Pratyag-atma, the abstract and universal Ego, and are now in sight of the Param-atma, the supreme, the Absolute Self (which is truly the full signifi- cance and nature of the Self and is named after it for special reasons), the Brahman which is the final goal and the final place of peace.
Or perhaps we feel another difficulty. Per- haps we feel a sudden revulsion at this stage and cry : " This commonplace ' I ' that everyone is glibly talking about and relishing acutely every moment of his life, from babbling baby to garrulous old man in dotage — is this the
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mysterious, marvellous and mystic vision of beatitude and perfection that we hoped for ? I that am so small, so weak, how can I be the unreachable, all-glorious Supreme ! " Let us be patient if we would understand. Let us go back to our question ; reformulate it to ourselves. Have we been, at the bottom of our heart, seeking so long for immortality, or only for a ' glorious vision ' of something which is graded on to our present experiences, for an enlargement of our powers and our worldly possessions transformed into subtler material but the same in kind? If we have longed for such then let us seek for them by all means ; but the way is different ; and the result is limited and poor by comparison. Nachiketa refused such glorious states. He wanted immortality. If the emmet were to sigh for sovereignty of a world-wide human empire, it would be a glorious consummation indeed, as compared with its present condition, when it attained thereto, as it surely would if it desired persistently and ardently enough. But would that glorious consummation be a final consum- mation ? Do we wish for only such a one ? What if one were ruler of a solar system, omniscient and omnipotent — but omniscient and omnipotent within the poor limits of a solar system only ! One solar system may be,
THE SELF AND THE NOT-SELF. 29
nay, must be, to another solar system — circum- scribed by a sufficiently greater breadth of space and length of time — even as a small molecule is to the whole earth-globe ; and such comparative smallness and greatness are endless. The ruler of a solar system, of a hundred, of a thousand, of a million solar systems rolled into one, must die, as suck ruler. His life, as such ruler, had a beginning and must have an end. This fact is almost plain to the physical senses, to say nothing of logical inferences. Physical science sees stars and systems beginning and ending. Whatever tenure of true immortality such a ruler has, he has it because of the identity of his self with the Pratyag-atma, the universal Self, even as much as, and no more and no less than, the meanest worm whose form exists within his system. We do not at present seek for any- thing that is only comparative and circum- scribed and limited by death at both ends. We want an immortality that is unlimited and uncomparative. Such can be found only in the pure ' I.' Thoughtlessness says : " This thing is commonplace and unimportant," only because it is familiar. Serious thought on the other hand perceives, in that same ever-present and every where- present nearness and pervasion of all life and all consciousness and all universal processes, the conclusive evidence of unlimited-
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ness and true immortality and everlastingness. This Pratyag-atma declares its utter purity and transparency and transcendence of all limita- tions whatever, gross and glorious, through the mouth of Krishna : " The ' I ' is the origin and the end of all the worlds. There is nothing higher than the 'I,' O winner of (the) wealth (of wisdom) ! All this (world) is strung together on the ' I ' even as jewels on a thread." l
We may think again, with lurking doubt as to the value of our finding : " I knew this ' I ' indeed before I started on my quest ! " That we did so is no detraction from the value of our finding now. We knew it then, it is true, but how vaguely, how doubtingly, bandying it about between a hundred different and con- flicting hypotheses ; compare that knowledge with the utter all-embracing fulness of the knowledge of the nature of the ' I ' that we have now attained to. Indeed it is the law of all enquiry about anything and everything that we begin with a partial knowledge and end with a fuller one. None can turn attention to that of which he knows nothing at all ; none needs to enquire about that of which he knows all already. To start on the quest of the north pole we must have at least the know-
1 Bkagavad-Gttd. vii. 6, 7.
THE SELF AND THE NOT-SELF. 31
ledge that it possibly exists and in a certain direction. This knowledge is very different in fulness from the knowledge we would acquire if we actually stood on the north pole ; still it is partial knowledge of it The reconciliation of the antitheses involved in the paradox that we cannot talk about what we do not know, and need not talk about what we do know, will be seen later on to lie in this : As everything in the universe is connected with everything else therein, so every piece of knowledge is connected with every other ; and therefore every Jiva possessing any piece of knowledge is potentially in possession of all knowledge ; and enquiry and rinding, in the individual life, mean only the passing from the less full to the fuller, from the potential to the actual, knowledge. In other words, the unfolding of the knowledge existing, but con- cealed, within the Jiva, appears as enquiry and finding. Thus then we can talk about all things because we know a little of them all, and need to talk about them because we wish to know more. Look we not then with slight upon this simple ' I.' " The heedless ones contemn the ' I ' embodied in the human frame, unwitting of the supreme status of that ' I,' as the Great Lord of all that hath come forth." x
1 Ibid. ix. ii.
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There is one point here which should be borne in mind. The full knowledge obtained by the traveller when he has attained his goal may be set down by him exhaustively in a book, reading which another may acquire that knowledge ; and yet there will be a difference of degree, the difference between direct and indirect, between the knowledge of the two. And such difference will always hold good as regards things material, whether gross or subtle (even those loosely but not accurately called spiritual). But as regards abstract principles, the universal ' I ' and the abstract laws and lower principles that flow from that ' I ' direct, and are imposed by its being as laws on the world-process — in their case knowledge and finding are one ; there is no distinction between direct and indirect knowledge, intellectual cog- nition and realisation. In this respect meta- physic is on the same level as arithmetic and geometry. What the true significance is of the distinction currently made between the so-called ' mere intellectual cognition ' of Brahman and the ' realisation ' thereof, TTfaf, paroksha, beyond sight, and wrctaf, aparoksha, not beyond sight, knowledge, will appear later. l
Having thus necessarily abstracted and sepa-
1 See the last page.
THE SELF AND THE NOT-SELF. 33
rated out from the world - process the true, universal, and unlimited One, out of which all so-called universals borrow their pseudo- universality, we equally necessarily find left behind a mass of particulars. And just as it is not possible to define the ' I ' any further than by naming it the ' I,' so is it not possible to define this mass of particulars other- wise than by naming it the ' Not-I,' the ' Not- Self,' the 'Non-Ego,' Mula-prakriti. Take it at any point of space and time, it is always a particular something which can be cognised as object in contrast with the cognising subject. As the characteristic of the ' I ' is universality and abstractness, so is the characteristic of the ' Not-I ' particularity and concreteness. It is always a 'this,' a 'that,' a something that is always, in ultimate analysis, limited and defin- able in terms of the senses. Its special name is the Many, as that of the Self is the One. That it is generalised under the word ' Not-Self is only a pseudo-generalisation by reflection of the universality of the ' I.' The word pseudo is used to distinguish the universality of the one from that of the other. It does not mean false in the sense of ' non-existent,' but only in the sense of ' apparent,' ' not real,' ' borrowed,' ' reflected.' The physical fact of the con- tinuance and indestructibility of matter illus-
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trates this fact. Because the ' I ' and the ' Not-I ' always imply each other and can never be actually separated, they are always imposing on each other one another's attri- butes. The ' I ' is always becoming particu- larised into individuals, and the ' Not-I ' always becoming generalised into the elements and classes and kinds of matter, because of this juxtaposition of the two, because of their immanence within each other.
Further treatment of this point belongs to a later stage of the discussion. It is enough to show here that the searcher necessarily comes at the last stage but one to these two, the Self and the Not-Self.
It should be added that at this stage, having traced his ego into the universal Ego, the Jiva finds a partial satisfaction and peace. Seeing that the universal Ego is unlimited by space and time, he feels sure of his immortality, and does not yet feel any great care and anxiety precisely to define the nature of that immortality. He is for the time being content to take it as a universal immortality in which all egos are merged into one without any clear distinction and specialisation, for he feels that such speciali- sation is part of the limited and perishing, and so incapable of such immortality as belongs to the Pratyag-atma. Later on he will begin to
THE SELF AND THE NOT-SELF. 35
ask whether there is any such thing as personal immortaHty also ; he will find that in the con- stitution of the material sheaths which make of him an individual ego out of the universal Ego, there is a craving for such personal immortality,1 for a continuance of existence as separate ; and he will also find that such is possible, nay certain, in its own special sense and manner. Just now, there is but one last remaining doubt that makes him find but a partial peace and satisfaction in the finding of the universal Ego.
1 See Stirling's Secret of Hegel. 2nd Ed. Pp. 213, 214, and his Schwegler. Pp. 435,436.