-people, and then another word,
viz. five, which qualifies the former; these two words together
therefore convey the idea of five pentads, i.e. twenty-five. Now as many
beings as the number twenty-five presupposes, just so many categories
the Sankhya system counts. Cp. Sa@nkhya Karika, 3: 'The fundamental
causal substance (i.e. the pradhana) is not an effect. Seven
(substances), viz. the Great one (Intellect), and so on, are causal
substances as well as effects. Sixteen are effects. The soul is neither
a causal substance nor an effect.' As therefore the number twenty-five,
which occurs in the scriptural passage quoted, clearly refers to the
twenty-five categories taught in the Sa@nkhya-sm/ri/ti, it follows that
the doctrine of the pradhana, &c. rests on a scriptural basis.

To this reasoning we make the following reply.--It is impossible to base
the assertion that the pradhana, &c. have Scripture in their favour on
the reference to their number which you pretend to find in the text, 'on
account of the diversity of the Sa@nkhya categories.' The Sa@nkhya
categories have each their individual difference, and there are no
attributes belonging in common to each pentad on account of which the
number twenty-five could be divided into five times five. For a number
of individually separate things can, in general, not be combined into
smaller groups of two or three, &c. unless there be a special reason for
such combination.--Here the Sa@nkhya will perhaps rejoin that the
expression five (times) five is used only to denote the number
twenty-five which has five pentads for its constituent parts; just as
the poem says, 'five years and seven Indra did not rain,' meaning only
that there was no rain for twelve years.--But this explanation also is
not tenable. In the first place, it is liable to the objection that it
has recourse to indirect indication.[235] In the second place, the
second 'five' constitutes a compound with the word 'people,' the
Brahma/n/a-accent showing that the two form one word only.[236] To the
same conclusion we are led by another passage also (Taitt. Sa/m/h. I, 6,
2, 2, pa/nk/ana/m/ tva pa/nk/ajananam, &c.) where the two terms
constitute one word, have one accent and one case-termination. The word
thus being a compound there is neither a repetition of the word 'five,'
involving two pentads, nor does the one five qualify the other, as the
mere secondary member of a compound cannot be qualified by another
word.--Bu