But perhaps you (the Sa@nkhya) will say that, after all, suffering (on the part of the soul) is real[346].  In that case, however, the impossibility of release is all the more undeniable[347], especially as the cause of suffering (viz. the pradhana) is admitted to be eternal.—­And if (to get out of this difficulty) you maintain that, although the potentialities of suffering (on the part of the soul) and of causing suffering (on the part of the pradhana) are eternal, yet suffering, in order to become actual, requires the conjunction of the two—­which conjunction in its turn depends on a special reason, viz. the non-discrimination of the pradhana by the soul—­and that hence, when that reason no longer exists, the conjunction of the two comes to an absolute termination, whereby the absolute release of the soul becomes possible; we are again unable to accept your explanation, because that on which the non-discrimination depends, viz. the gu/n/a, called Darkness, is acknowledged by you to be eternal.

And as[348] there is no fixed rule for the (successive) rising and sinking of the influence of the particular gu/n/as, there is also no fixed rule for the termination of the cause which effects the conjunction of soul and pradhana (i.e. non-discrimination); hence the disjunction of the two is uncertain, and so the Sa@nkhyas cannot escape the reproach of absence of final release resulting from their doctrine.  To the Vedantin, on the other hand, the idea of final release being impossible cannot occur in his dreams even; for the Self he acknowledges to be one only, and one thing cannot enter into the relation of subject and object, and Scripture, moreover, declares that the plurality of effects originates from speech only.  For the phenomenal world, on the other hand, we may admit the relation of sufferer and suffering just as it is observed, and need neither object to it nor refute it.

Herewith we have refuted the doctrine which holds the pradhana to be the cause of the world.  We have now to dispose of the atomic theory.

We begin by refuting an objection raised by the atomists against the upholders of Brahman.—­The Vai/s/eshikas argue as follows:  The qualities which inhere in the substance constituting the cause originate qualities of the same kind in the substance constituting the effect; we see, for instance, that from white threads white cloth is produced, but do not observe what is contrary (viz. white threads resulting in a piece of cloth of a different colour).  Hence, if the intelligent Brahman is assumed as the cause of the world, we should expect to find intelligence inherent in the effect also, viz. the world.  But this is not the case, and consequently the intelligent Brahman cannot be the cause of the world.—­This reasoning the Sutrakara shows to be fallacious, on the ground of the system of the Vai/s/eshikas themselves.

II.  Or (the world may originate from Brahman) as the great and the long originate from the short and the atomic.