i.e. the infinite number of auspicious qualities; for thus the twofold indications (li@nga) met with in Scripture are fully justified (26).—­In what relation, then, does the a/k/id vastu, i.e. the non-sentient matter, which, according to the b/ri/hadara/n/yaka, is one of the forms of Brahman, stand to the latter?—­Non-sentient beings might, in the first place, be viewed as special arrangements (sa/m/sthanavisesha/h/) of Brahman, as the coils are of the body of the snake; for Brahman is designated as both, i.e. sometimes as one with the world (Brahman is all this, &c.), sometimes as different from it (Let me enter into those elements, &c.) (27).—­Or, in the second place, the relation of the two might be viewed as analogous to that of light and the luminous object which are two and yet one, both being fire (28).—­Or, in the third place, the relation is like that stated before, i.e. the material world is, like the individual souls (whose case was discussed in II, 3, 43), a part—­a/ms/a—­of Brahman (29, 30).

Adhik.  VII (31-37) explains how some metaphorical expressions, seemingly implying that there is something different from Brahman, have to be truly understood.

Adhik.  VIII (38-41) teaches that the reward of works is not, as Jaimini opines, the independent result of the works acting through the so-called apurva, but is allotted by the Lord.

PADA III.

With the third pada of the second adhyaya a new section of the work begins, whose task it is to describe how the individual soul is enabled by meditation on Brahman to obtain final release.  The first point to be determined here is what constitutes a meditation on Brahman, and, more particularly, in what relation those parts of the Upanishads stand to each other which enjoin identical or partly identical meditations.  The reader of the Upanishads cannot fail to observe that the texts of the different sakhas contain many chapters of similar, often nearly identical, contents, and that in some cases the text of even one and the same sakha exhibits the same matter in more or less varied forms.  The reason of this clearly is that the common stock of religious and philosophical ideas which were in circulation at the time of the composition of the Upanishads found separate expression in the different priestly communities; hence the same speculations, legends, &c. reappear in various places of the sacred Scriptures in more or less differing dress.  Originally, when we may suppose the members of each Vedic school to have confined themselves to the study of their own sacred texts, the fact that the texts of other schools contained chapters of similar contents would hardly appear to call for special note or comment; not any more than the circumstance that the sacrificial performances enjoined on the followers of some particular sakha were found described with greater or smaller modifications