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Again, the world could not have sprung into being without any cause (ahetutah). The Buddhist logicians try to controvert this view by pointing out that, whatever a view may be, it must be established by proper proof. So, in order to prove the thesis that all existents are un- produced, the Madhyamikas must give some proofs, and this would involve a further specification of the nature of such proofs and a specification of the number of valid proofs admitted by them. But, if the thesis that “‘all existents are unproved’”’ is a mere assertion without any proof to support it, then any number of counter- assertions may be made for which no proof need be shown; and, if proofs are not required in one case, they cannot be required in the other. So one could with equal validity assert that all existents are real and are produced from causes. The Madhyamika answer to such an objection, as formulated by Candrakirti, is that the Madhyamika has no thesis of his own and so the question whether his thesis is supported by valid proof or not is as meaningless as the question regarding the smallness or the greatness of a mule’s horn. Since there is no thesis, the Madhyamika has nothing to 1 Méddhyamika-vrtti, p. 36. See also Stcherbatsky’s The Conception of Buddhist Nirvana, to which the author is indebted for the translation and some of the materials of the last two paragraphs. x1] Dialectic of Nagarjuna and Vedanta Dialectic 167 say regarding the nature of valid proofs (pramana) or their number. But it may well be asked why, if the Madhyamika has no thesis of his own, should he hold the proposition that all existents are unproduced (sarve bhava anutpannah)? To this the Madhyamika replies that such propositions appear as definite views only to ordinary people, not to the wise. The proper attitude for the wise is always to remain silent. They impart instruction only from a popular point cf view to those who want to listen to them. Their arguments are not their own or those which they believe to be right, but only such as would appeal to their hearers. It is not out of place here to mention that the Madhyamika school wishes to keep the phenomenal and the real or the transcen- dental views wide apart. In the phenomenal view things are ad- mitted to be as they are perceived, and their relations are also conceived as real. It is interesting to refer to the discussion of Candrakirti with Dinnaga regarding the nature of sense-percep- tions. While Dinnaga urges that a thing is what it is in itself (sva-laksana), Candrakirti holds that, since relations are also per- ceived to be true, things are relational as well. Phenomenally substances exist as well as their qualities. The ‘thing in itself” of Dinnaga was as much a relative concept as the relational things that are popularly perceived as true; that being so, it is meaningless to define perception as being only the thing in itself. Candrakirti thus does not think that any good can be done by criticizing the realistic logic of the Naiyayikas, since, so far as popular perceptions or conceptions go, the Nyaya logic is quite competent to deal with them and give an account of them. There is a phenomenal reality and order which is true for the man in the street and on which all our linguistic and other usages are based. Dinnaga, in defining perception, restricts it to the unique thing in itself (sva-laksana) and thinks that all associations of quality and relations are ex- traneous to perceptions and should be included under imagination or inference. This however does violence to our ordinary experience and yet serves no better purpose; for the definition of perception as given by Dinnaga is not from the transcendental point of view. If that is so, why not accept the realistic conceptions of the Nyaya school, which fit in with the popular experience? This reminds us of the attitude of the Vedantists, who on the one _hand accepted the view-point of popular experience and regarded all things as having a real objective existence, and on the other 168 The Sankara School of Vedanta [cH. hand considered them as false and unreal from the transcendental point of view of ultimate reality. The attitude of the Vedantists on this point seems to have been directly inspired by that of the Madhyamikas. The attempts of Sriharsa to refute the realistic definitions of the Nyaya were intended to show that the definitions of the Nyaya could not be regarded as absolute and true, as the Naiyayikas used to think. But, while the Madhyamikas, who had no view-points of their own to support, could leave the field of experience absolutely undisturbed and allow the realistic defini- tions of the Nyaya to explain the popular experience in any way they liked, the Vedanta had a thesis of its own, namely, that the self-luminous Brahman was the only reality and that it was through it that everything else was manifested. The Vedanta there- fore could not agree with Nyaya interpretations of experience and their definitions. But, as the Vedanta was unable to give the manifold world-appearance a footing in reality, it regarded it as somehow existing by itself and invented a theory of perception by which it could be considered as being manifested by coming in touch with Brahman and being illusorily imposed on it. Continuing the discussion on the nature of causation, Nagar- juna and Candrakirti hold that collocations of causal conditions which are different from the effect cannot produce the effect, as is held by the Hinayaina Buddhists; for, since the effect is not per- ceived in those causal conditions, it cannot be produced out of them, and, if it is already existent in them, its production becomes useless. Production of anything out of some foreign or extraneous causes implies that it is related to them, and this relation must mean that it was in some way existent in them. The main principle which Nagarjuna employs in refuting the idea of causation or production in various ways is that, if a thing exists, it cannot be produced, and, if it does not exist, it cannot be produced at all. That which has no essence in itself cannot be caused by anything else, and, having no essence in itself, it cannot be the cause of anything else}. Nagarjuna similarly examines the concepts of going and coming and says that the action of going is not to be found in the space traversed, nor is it to be found in that which is not traversed; and apart from the space traversed and not traversed there cannot be any action of going. If it is urged that going is neither in the space 1 Madhyamika-vrtti, p. 90, 1. 6. xt] Dialectic of Nagarjuna and Vedanta Dialectic 169 traversed nor in the space untraversed, but in the person who continues to go, since going is in him in whom there is the effort of going, then this again cannot be right. For, if the action of going is to be associated with the person who goes, it cannot be asso- ciated with the space traversed. One action cannot be connected with both; and, unless some space is gone over, there cannot be a goer. If going is in the goer alone, then even without going one could be called a goer, which is impossible. If both the goer and the space traversed have to be associated with going, then there must be two actions and not one; and, if there are two actions, that implies that there are also two agents. It may be urged that the movement of going is associated with the goer and that therefore going belongs to the goer; but, if there is no going without the goer and if there is no goer without going, how can going be associated with the goer at all? Again, in the proposition “the goer goes” (ganta gacchati) there is only one action of going, and that is satisfied by the verb ‘“‘goes’’; what separate “‘going” is there by virtue of association with which a ‘“‘goer” can be so called? and, since there are no two actions of going, there cannot be a goer. Again, the movement of going cannot even be begun; for, when there is the motion of going, there is no beginning and when there is no motion of going, there cannot be any beginning. Again, it cannot be urged that “going” must exist, since its opposite, ‘‘re- maining at rest” (sthiti), exists; for who is at rest? The goer cannot be at rest, since no one can be a goer unless he goes; he who is not a goer, being already at rest, cannot be the agent of another action of being at rest. If the goer and going be regarded as identical, then there would be neither verb nor agent. So there is no reality in going. ‘‘Going” stands here for any kind of passage or becoming, and the refutation of “ going” implies the refutation of all kinds of passage (niskarsana) as well. If seeds passed into the state of shoots (ankura), then they would be seeds and not shoots ; the shoots neither are seeds nor are different from them; yet, the seeds being there, there are the shoots. A pea is from another pea, yet no pea becomes another pea. A pea is neither in another pea nor different from it. It is as one may see in a mirror the beautiful face of a woman and feel attracted by it and run after her, though the face never passed into the mirror and there was no human face in the reflected image. Just as the essenceless reflected image of a woman’s face may rouse attachment in fools, 170 The Sankara School of Vedanta [cH. so are world-appearances the causes of our delusion and attach- ment. It is needless to multiply examples and describe elaborately Nagarjuna’s method of applying his dialectic to the refutation of the various Buddhistic and other categories. But from what has been said it may be possible to compare or contrast Nagarjuna’s dialectic with that of Sriharsa.