428 Further observations on [Sept. 



terre. Le contact mutuel du vent et du metal pvoduit le feu et la lu- 

 miere, qui sont les principes des changemens et des modifications. La 

 lumiere precieuse engendre la liquidite qui bouillonne a la surface de la 

 lumiere ign£e, d'ou provientle tourbillon d'eau qui embrasse les mondes 

 de toute part." 



Now I ask, is there a man living, not familiar with the subject, who 

 can extract a particle of sense from the above passage ? And are not 

 such passages, produced in illustration of a novel theme, the veriest 

 obscurations thereof ? But let us see what can be made of the enigma. 

 This apercu cosmogonique of the Long-yan-king, is, in fact, a descrip- 

 tion of the procession of the five elements, one from another, and 

 ultimately from Prajna, the universal material principle, very nearly 

 akin to the Pradhdn of the Kapila Sankhya. This universal principle 

 has two modes or states of being, one of which is the proper, absolute, 

 and enduring mode ; the other, the contingent, relative, and transitoiy. 



The former is abstraction from all effects, or quiescence : the latter 

 is concretion with all effects, or activity, When the intrinsic energy 

 of matter is exerted, effects exist ; when that energy relapses into repose, 

 they exist not. All worlds and beings composing the versatile universe 

 are cumulative effects ; and though the so-called elements composing 

 them be evolved and revolved in a given manner, one from and to 

 another, and though each be distinguished by a given property or pro- 

 perties, the distinctions, as well as the orderly evolution and revolution, 

 are mere results of the gradually increasing and decreasing energy of 

 nature in a state of activity*. Updya, or ' the expedient', is the name of 

 this energy ; — increase of it is increase of phenomenal properties ; — de- 

 crease of it is decrease of phenomenal properties. All phenomena are 

 homogeneous and alike unreal ; gravity and extended figure, no less so 

 than colour or sound. Extension in the abstract is not a phenomenon, 

 nor belongs properly to the versatile world. The productive energv 

 begins at a minimum of intensity, and increasing to a maximum, thence 

 decreases again to a minimum. Hence dkdsh, the first product, has but 

 one quality or property ; air, the second, has two ; fire, the third, 



* Causes and effects, quoad the versatile world, cannot be truly alleged to exist. 

 There is merely customary conjunction, and certain limited effects of proximity 

 in the precedent and subsequent, by virtue of the one true and universal cause, 

 viz. Prajna. With the primitive Swobhavikas cause is notunitised: for the rest, 

 their tenets are very much the same with those above explained in the text, only 

 their conclusions incline rather to scepticism than dogmatism. It may also per- 

 haps be doubted whether with the latter school, phenomena are unreal as well as 

 homogeneous. In the text, I would be understood to state the tenets of the Praj- 

 nikas only. 



