Mr. CoLEBROOKE 071 the Philosophy of Indian Sectaries. 577 



and praise of Bhagavat the deity, and with reverential bowing and other 

 ceremonies ; 2dly. By gathering and providing blossoms, and other requisites 

 of worship ; 3dly. By actual performance of divine worship ; 4thly. By study 

 of the sacred text (Bkagaval-sdstra) and reading, hearing, and reflecting 

 on that and other holy books (^purdn'as and dgamas), which are conformable 

 to it ; 5thly. By profound meditation and absorbed contemplation after 

 evening worship, and intensely fixing the thoughts exclusively on (Bha- 

 gavat) the deity. 



By such devotion, both active and contemplative {criya-ybga and jnydna- 

 yoga), performed at five different times of each day, and persisted in 

 for a hundred years, Vasudeva is attained ; and by reaching his divine 

 presence, the votary accomplishes final deUverance, with everlasting 

 beatitude. 



Against this system, which is but partially heretical, the objection upon 

 which the chief stress is laid by Vyasa, as interpreted by S'ancara * and 

 the rest of the scholiasts, is, that ' the soul would not be eternal, if it were a 

 production, and consequently had a beginning. Springing from the deity, 

 and finally returning to him, it would merge in its cause and be re-absorbed ; 

 there would be neither reward nor punishment ; neither a heaven, nor a 

 hell : and this doctrine virtually would amount to {iidsticyd) denial of 

 another world. Nor can the soul, becoming active, produce mind ; nor 

 again this, becoming active, produce consciousness. An agent does not 

 generate an instrument, though he may construct one by means of tools ; a 

 carpenter does not create, but fabricate, an axe. Nor can four distinct 

 persons be admitted, as so many forms of the same self-divided being, not 

 springing one from the otlier, but all of them alike endued with divine 

 attributes, and consequently all four of them gods. There is but one God, 

 one Supreme Being. It is vain to assume morej and the Pancha-rdtra 

 itself affirms the unity of God.* 



A few scattered observations have been thrown out on the similarity of 

 the Greek and Indian philosophy, in this and preceding portions of the 

 present essay. At the close of the series, after treating of the Uttara 

 Mimdnsd and Veddnta, a topic which should come next after the Purva 

 Mimdnsd, and before this supplemental essay concerning sectaries, but which 



• Br. Sulr. 2. 2. 8. (42—45). Sane, Sfc. 



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