ifest
when they are cleaned by the application of some acid substance; so it
may be said, likewise, that the stars, whose light is during daytime
overpowered (by the superior brilliancy of the sun), become manifest in
their true nature at night when the overpowering (sun) has departed. But
it is impossible to speak of an analogous overpowering of the eternal
light of intelligence by whatever agency, since, like ether, it is free
from all contact, and since, moreover, such an assumption would be
contradicted by what we actually observe. For the (energies of) seeing,
hearing, noticing, cognising constitute the character of the individual
soul, and that character is observed to exist in full perfection, even
in the case of that individual soul which has not yet risen beyond the
body. Every individual soul carries on the course of its practical
existence by means of the activities of seeing, hearing, cognising;
otherwise no practical existence at all would be possible. If, on the
other hand, that character would realise itself in the case of that soul
only which has risen above the body, the entire aggregate of practical
existence, as it actually presents itself prior to the soul's rising,
would thereby be contradicted. We therefore ask: Wherein consists that
(alleged) rising from the body? Wherein consists that appearing (of the
soul) in its own form?

To this we make the following reply.--Before the rise of discriminative
knowledge the nature of the individual soul, which is (in reality) pure
light, is non-discriminated as it were from its limiting adjuncts
consisting of body, senses, mind, sense-objects and feelings, and
appears as consisting of the energies of seeing and so on. Similarly--to
quote an analogous case from ordinary experience--the true nature of a
pure crystal, i.e. its transparency and whiteness, is, before the rise
of discriminative knowledge (on the part of the observer),
non-discriminated as it were from any limiting adjuncts of red or blue
colour; while, as soon as through some means of true cognition
discriminative knowledge has arisen, it is said to have now accomplished
its true nature, i.e. transparency and whiteness, although in reality it
had already done so before. Thus the discriminative knowledge, effected
by /S/ruti, on the part of the individual soul which previously is
non-discriminated as it were from its limiting adjuncts, is (according
to the scriptural passage under discussion) the sou