The purvapakshin maintains that on account of the declaration of the person’s size the cognitional Self is meant.  For to the highest Self which is of infinite length and breadth Scripture would not ascribe the measure of a span; of the cognitional Self, on the other hand, which is connected with limiting adjuncts, extension of the size of a span may, by means of some fictitious assumption, be predicated.  Sm/ri/ti also confirms this, ’Then Yama drew forth, by force, from the body of Satyavat the person of the size of a thumb tied to Yama’s noose and helpless’ (Mahabh.  III, 16763).  For as Yama could not pull out by force the highest Self, the passage is clearly seen to refer to the transmigrating (individual soul) of the size of a thumb, and we thence infer that the same Self is meant in the Vedic passage under discussion.

To this we reply that the person a thumb long can only be the highest Lord.—­Why?—­On account of the term ’lord of the past and of the future.’  For none but the highest Lord is the absolute ruler of the past and the future.—­Moreover, the clause ‘this is that’ connects the passage with that which had been enquired about, and therefore forms the topic of discussion.  And what had been enquired about is Brahman, ’That which thou seest as neither this nor that, as neither effect nor cause, as neither past nor future, tell me that’ (I, 2, 14).—­’On account of the term,’ i.e. on account of the direct statement, in the text, of a designation, viz. the term ‘Lord,’ we understand that the highest Lord is meant[191].—­But still the question remains how a certain extension can be attributed to the omnipresent highest Self.—­The reply to this is given, in the next Sutra.

25.  But with reference to the heart (the highest Self is said to be of the size of a span), as men are entitled (to the study of the Veda).

The measure of a span is ascribed to the highest Lord, although omnipresent with reference to his abiding within the heart; just as to ether (space) the measure of a cubit is ascribed with reference to the joint of a bamboo.  For, on the one hand, the measure of a span cannot be ascribed directly to the highest Self which exceeds all measure, and, on the other hand, it has been shown that none but the highest Lord can be meant here, on account of the term ‘Lord,’ and so on.—­But—­an objection may be raised—­as the size of the heart varies in the different classes of living beings it cannot be maintained that the declaration of the highest Self being of the size of a thumb can be explained with reference to the heart.—­To this objection the second half of the Sutra replies:  On account of men (only) being entitled.  For the sastra, although propounded without distinction (i.e. although not itself specifying what class of beings is to proceed according to its precepts), does in reality entitle men[192] only (to act according to its precepts); for men only (of the three higher castes) are, firstly,