III.

ON THE DRIFT OF THE SA NKHYA PHILOSOPHY.

Of the three leading systems of Indian philosophy, the Sankhya is the least studied. "The subject indeed (says Professor H. H. Wilson, at page viii. of his preface to the Sánkhya Káriká) is but little cultivated by the Pandits, and, during the whole of my intercourse with learned natives, I met but one Brahman who professed to be acquainted with the writings of this school." These writings are not numerous-the half dozen works that are to be met with, exhibiting a very meagre array beside the scores of volumes devoted to the Nyáya. The Sánkhya work most generally read in these provinces is the Tatwa-kaumudi-a commentary on the seventy memorial verses' in which the exposition of the system has been comprised. The commentary of GAUDAPÁDA, of which Prof. Wilson published a translation, along with Mr. Colebrooke's version of the memorial verses,' appears to be known here only by name, except to those who have seen Prof. Wilson's edition of it.

The memorial verses' are based on the collection of aphorisms attributed to KAPILA, the alleged author of the doctrine. These aphorisms are given, with annotations, in the KAPILA-BHASHYA, which was printed at Serampore in 1821.

"It appears [says Mr. Colebrooke, at page 231, vol. I, of his collected Essays] from the preface of the CAPILA-BHASHYA, that a more compendious tract, in the same form of sútras or aphorisms, bears the title of Tatwasamása, and is ascribed to the same author CAPILA.

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* *. If the authority of the scholiast of CAPILA may be trusted, the Tatwa-samása is the proper text of the Sánc'hya. * * Whether the Talwa-samása of CAPILA be extant, or whether the sutras of Panchas'ic ́ha be so, is not certain. The latter are frequently cited, and by modern authors on the Sánc ́hya: whence a presumption, that they may be yet forthcoming."

We have not been able to procure the sútras of Panchas ́ikha but we have met with a copy of the Tatwa-samása, from which we shall quote. Our design is to convey concisely, to the general reader, our own conception of the drift and significance of the Sánkhya doctrine-a doctrine the details of which the student will find in Mr. Colebrooke's Essay, and in Prof. Wilson's elaborate exposition of the Sankhya Káriká.

VOL. III,

F

Two explanations are given of the term 'Sánkhya' :

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"The Sankhya philosophy (says Prof. Wilson, page xi.) is so termed, as Mr. Colebrooke has mentioned, because it observes precision of reckoning in the enumeration of its principles, Sankhya being understood to signify numeral,' agreeably, to the usual acceptations of Sankhya' number;' "and hence its analogy to the Pythagorean philosophy has been presumed." The term is also explained, however, as Mr. Colebrooke proceeds to mention, to denote the result of deliberation or judgment, such being one sense of the word Sankhya, from which Sankhya is derived."

We incline (as Prof. Wilson appears to do) to the latter explanation the system being, as we take it, the result of the "deliberate judgment" of KAPILA on the great problem of the universe-with a special regard to emancipation from the evil that prevails in it.

The commentary on the Tatwa-samása commences drama. tically:

“A certain Bráhman, aggrieved by the three kinds of pain, had recourse to the great sage KAPILA, the teacher of the Sankhya. Having declared his family, his name and race, and his desire of instruction, he said- Venerable Sir ! What is of all things the most important? What is actual truth? And what must I do, in order that I may have done what is fitting to be done?' KAPILA replied—' I will tell you.'

The sage then enounces the

aphorisms of the Sánkhya in the form of twenty-five topics as follows:

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"Eight producers' (prakriti); sixteen productions' (rikára); soul' (purusha); the triad of qualities' (traigunya); development' (sanchara); 'dissolution' (prati-sanchara); the instruments of soul' (adhyátma); the province of an organ' (adhibhúta); the presiding supernatural agent' (adhidaivata); the five functions of the faculties (abhibuddhi; the five sources of action' (karmma-yoni); the five airs' (váyu); the five that consist of action' (karmmitman ;) ignorance' (avidya) under five divisions ; disability' (as akti) of twenty eight kinds; acquiescence' (tushti) of nine kinds; perfectness' (siddhi) of eight kinds; the radical categories' (múlikártha) of ten kinds; benevolent nature' (anugrahasarga; elemental creation' (bhúta-sarga) of ten kinds; parental creation' (dhátusansarga) of three kinds; threefold bondage' (bandaha); threefold liberation' (moksha) ; threefold ' proof” (pramáña); threefold 'pain' (du'kha):-in this consists all actual truth. He who shall have thoroughly understood this, will have done all that is to be done. He will not again he obnoxious to the three kinds of pain."

Such are the aphorisms of the Sankhya, entitled the Compendium of Principles' (tatwa-samása).

The rest of the book consists of a commentary (by_an anonymous author) on the topics thus enumerated. The writer borrows many passages from the Bhagavad-gítá and other poems; and is impartial enough to give the Vedánti

arguments in favour of the unity of Soul' at about equal length with those quoted in favour of the Sánkhya doctrine of its multiplicity. The reader of Prof. Wilson's Sankhya Káriká will have been struck with the occurrence of some terms in the foregoing enumeration, ('abhibuddhi,' for example,) which do not seem to occur in the Sánkhya works usually read, and which are not noticed in the great Dictionary of our friend the Rájá Rádhákánt Deb. But, to dilate on this, and some other kindred considerations, is no part of our present design.

The topics with which we are chiefly concerned at present are the first three-viz: the 'producers,' the productions,' and soul.' The eight producers' are stated to be the 'undiscrete' (avyakta ;) intellect' (buddhi); self-consciousness' (ahankára); and the five subtile elements' (tanmátra). The sixteen productions' are the eleven organs' (indriya) of intellect and of action; and the five derivative or gross 'elements' (bhúta). Soul'-enunciated in the third aphorism-is 'that which knows' (jna). These twenty five principles, according to the Sánkhya, constitute "all that is"; and Kapila, we have seen, promises the enquirer that his final liberation from all distress will be the result of understanding" the real nature of all that is." What this amounts to, according to Kapila, we have now to try if we can make out.

And first-a noticeable distinction between Kapila's way of speaking of things, and that of the Naiyáyikas, presents itself in their respective choice of a fundamental verb. The language of the Nyáya is moulded on the verb "to be," and that of the Sánkhya on the verb "to make." The Nyáya asks "what is?"-the Sánkhya asks "what makes it so ?" The one (as we observed in a former essay-vol. 1 p. 276.) presents us with a 'compte rendue' of the universe as it stands the other presents us with a cosmogony. As the one first subdivides its subject-matter into the two exhaustive categories of Existence and Non-existence, the other exhibits everything (except 'Soul')-the spectator of the phantasmagoria)-under the two aspects of producer' and 'pro

duction.'

It may somewhat tend to check the mischievous consequences attendant on bluntly regarding any current and influential Hindú doctrine, that happens not to accord with our accustomed notions, as being self-evidently frivolous and effete, if it can be shown that the conceptions involved in the doctrine are still influential in directing the current

of speculation in Europe, in quarters where that current runs (or is supposed to run) deepest. Having an eye to this, in comparing or contrasting the views of the Sankhya with those of modern European speculation, we shall take our representation of the latter chiefly from a writer, Mr. Morell, who does not, from any part of his work (the 'History of modern Philosophy ') appear to have directed his attention to India. At this point, then, in the enquiry, we beg the attention of the reader to the following passage from Mr. Morell (vol. 1. p. 208. 2nd ed.) where he speaks of one of the latest German systems-that of Herbart :

"The process by which the necessity of philosophy comes to be felt is the following:-When we look round us upon the world in which we live, our knowledge commences by a perception of the various objects that present themselves on every hand to our view. What we immediately perceive, however, is not actual essence, but phenomena; and after a short time, we discover that many of those phenomena are unreal; that they do not pourtray to us the actual truth of things as they are; and that if we followed them implicitly, we should soon be landed in the midst of error and contradiction. For example, what we are immediately conscious of in coming into contact with the external world, are such appearances as green, blue, bitter, sour, extension, resistance, &c. These phenomena, upon reflection, we discover not to be so many real independent existences, but properties inhering in certain substances, which we term things. Again, when we examine further into these substances, we discover that they are not real ultimate essences, but that they consist of certain elements, by the combination of which they are produced. What we term the reality, therefore, is not the thing as a whole, but the elements of which it is composed. Thus the further we analyse, the further does the idea of reality recede backwards; but still it must always be somewhere, otherwise we should be perceiving a nonentity. The last result of the analysis is the conception of an absolutely simple element, which lies at the basis of all phenomena in the material world, and which we view as the essence that assumes the different properties which come before us in 'sensation."

This "essence that assumes the different properties which come before us in sensation"-this which the European analyst arrives at as "the last result of the analysis"-is what the Sankhya expositor, proceeding, "more Indico," synthetically, lays down as his first position. This is Kapila's múlaprakriti-the " root of all "--the "radical producer "—that which, variously modified, constitutes all that the 'Soul' takes cognizance of. This primordial essence-among the synony mes for which, given in our text-book, are the undiscrete avyakta, the indestructible' akshara, that in which all generated effect is comprehended' 'pradhanaka," &c. is the Absolute' of German speculation. The development of

this principle, according to one of Schelling's views (noticed. by Mr. Morell at p. 147., vol. 2d) is "not the free and designed operation of intelligence, but rather a blind impulse working, first unconsciously in nature, and only coming to self-consciousness in mind." So, according to Kapila, "From Nature issues Mind, and thence self-consciousness." But here something strange presents itself-for the self-consciousness, which so many other philosophies assume as the only certain starting-point, and which some of them find it difficult to get beyond, is declared by Kapila to be the error of all errors that the Soul can fall into. In the 64th of the 'memorial verses,' as translated by Mr. Colebrooke, Kapila says:

"So, through study of principles, the conclusive, incontrovertible, one only knowledge is attained, that neither I AM, nor is aught mine, nor do I exist."

This statement, M. Cousin, not unnaturally regards as amounting to "le nihilisme absolu, dernier fruit du scepticisme" but Prof. Wilson, on the strength of the commentaries, declares that "It is merely intended as a negation of the soul's having any active participation, any individual interest or property, in human pains, possessions, or feelings." The Soul, according to the Sánkhya, might be described in terms in which Fichte speaks of the Mind, 66 as it were, an intelligent eye, placed in the central point of our inward consciousness, surveying all that takes place there." (Morell vol. 2, p. 95.) In the words of Kapila (verse 19th) "Soul is witness, solitary, bystander, spectator, and passive." Soul being thus passive, all that is done arises from the operation. of the radical principle'-of which one might correctly speak in the terms employed by Schelling in speaking of the Absolute,' where he says "The primary form of the Absolute is will, or self-action. It is an absolute power of becoming in reality what it is in the germ." (Morell. vol. 2, p. 150).

The Absolute,' the germ, in the hands of Kapila, having taken the form of self-consciousness—ahankára-the 'making of an I'-the 'positing of an Ego'-the course of subsequent development runs parallel, for some distance, with that followed by Fichte, who takes the 'Ego' as his starting point. According to a concise and luminous writer in Brande's dictionary.

"To use the language of Fichte--the ego is absolute, and posits itself; it is a pure activity. As its activity, however, has certain indefinable