—  848  — 
and  says:  «Since  the  «living  being»  does  not  exist,  the  Lord  did  not  declare 
that  it  is  different  from  the  body.  But  he  neither  has  declared  that  it  does  not 
exist,  fearing  that  this  could  be  understood  as  a  denial  of  the  empirical  Self. 
There  is  namely  in  the  stream  of  elements  a  certain  cdiving»  in  the  sense  (of 
actions  producing)  good  or  bad  results,  and  if  Buddha  had  said  that  there  is 
altogether  no  living  being,  (Vats a)  might  have  supposed  that  such  a  «living» 
too  does  not  exist.  Nor  did  he  declare  that  a  «living  being»  is  merely  a 
conventional  name  given  to  a  set  of  elements,  for  in  that  case  he  had  to  deal 
with  a  man  uncapable  of  realising  the  idea  of  Voidness  (i.  e.  the  absence  of 
a  real  personality  in  the  stream  of  elements  appearing  in  mutual  interdepen- 
dence). Thus  it  is  that  being  questioned  by  Vatsa  whether  the  Soul  did  or 
did  not  exist,  Buddha  took  into  consideration  the  intellectual  level  of  his 
interlocutor  and  did  give  no  answer.  But  if  a  Soul  did  exist,  nothing  could  have 
prevented  him  to  declare  that  it  did!» 
VatsipaMya.  And  why  did  Buddha  not  settle  the  questions  about  the 
Eternity  of  the  World  etc.? 
Vasubandhu.  For  the  same  reason!  He  took  into  consideration  the 
intention  of  the  questioner.  First  of  all  the  latter  would  have  meant  the 
(Universal)  Soul  to  be  the  World.  But  then  as  for  Buddha  no  (such)  Soul  did 
altogether  exist,  (every  answer  such  as:  it  is  eternal,  it  is  not  eternal,  it  is 
partly  eternal  and  partly  non  eternal,  it  is  neither  eternal  nor  non- eternal) 
would  have  been  out  of  place.  If  again  the  questioner  would  have  meant 
under  Universe  the  appearing  and  disappearing  of  all  (its  elements),-  again 
every  answer  would  have  been  out  of  place.  For  if  this  (process  of  life)  is 
eternal,  there  is  no  (hope  of  putting  an  end  to  it  in)  Final  Rescue.  If  it  is  non 
eternal,  then  it  will  break  up  altogether  (by  itself).  Supposing  it  to  be  both: 
(partly  non  eternal  and  partly  eternal),  then  some  living  beings  will  naturally 
attain  Final  Rescue  (without  any  effort),  and  other  ones  will  never  attain  it. 
And  lastly,  supposing  it  to  be  neither  eternal  nor  non-eternal  (we  get  a 
contradiction,  namely  that)  at  the  same  time  there  neither  will  be  any  Sal- 
vation nor  any  absence  of  Salvation!  As  a  matter  of  fact  Salvation  can  be 
attained  by  the  practice  of  the  Holy  Path  only,  therefore  every  (direct) 
unqualified  answer  would  have  been  incomplete.  Similarly  (Buddha  declined 
to  answer  the  question  of  a)  learned  Gymnosophist  who  taking  a 
Yagom.  fledgling  in  his  hand  (asked,  whether  it  was  living  or  not.  If  he  had  an- 
swered «it  is  living»  the  gymnosophist  would  have  squeezed  the  bird  in  his 
hand  and  shown  it  dead.  If  he  had  answered  «it  is  dead»  the  Gymnosophist 
would  have  shown  a  living  fledgling  and  thus  proved  to  the  audience  that 
