All this is due to Ignorance which does not understand that no bodily existence, by its very nature, can be Atman.  The reason why it is not Atman is this, that its formation is, after all, due to the union of matter and mind.  Now (let us) examine and analyze (mind and body).  Matter consists of the four elements of earth, water, fire, and wind, while mind consists of the four aggregates of perception,[FN#345] consciousness,[FN#346] conception,[FN#347] and knowledge.[FN#348]

[FN#345] A.  ’It receives both the agreeable and the disagreeable impressions from without.’  It is Yedana, the second of the five Skandhas, or aggregates.

[FN#346] A.  ‘It perceives the forms of external objects.’  It is Samjnya, name, the third of the five aggregates.

[FN#347] A.  ‘It acts, one idea changing after another.’  It is Samskara, the fourth of the five aggregates.

[FN#348] A.  ‘It recognizes.’  It is Vijnyana, the last of the five aggregates.

If all (these elements) be taken as Atman, there must be eight Atmans (for each person).  More than that!  There are many different things, even in the element of earth.  Now, there are three hundred and sixty bones, each one distinct from the other.  No one is the same as any other, either of the skin, hair, muscles, the liver, the heart, the spleen, and the kidneys.  Furthermore, there are a great many mental qualities each different from the others.  Sight is different from hearing.  Joy is not the same as anger.  If we enumerate them, in short, one after another, there are eighty thousand passions.[FN#349]

[FN#349] Eighty thousand simply means a great many.

As things are thus so innumerable, none can tell which of these (without mistake) is to be taken as the Atman.  In case all be taken as the Atman, there must be hundreds and thousands of Atmans, among which there would be as many conflicts and disturbances as there are masters living in the one (house of) body.  As there exists no body nor mind separated from these things, one can never find the Atman, even if he seeks for it over and over again.

Hereupon anyone understands that this life (of ours) is no more than the temporary union of numerous elements (mental and physical).  Originally there is no Atman to distinguish one being from another.  For whose sake, then, should he be lustful or angry?  For whose sake should he take life,[FN#350] or commit theft, or give alms, or keep precepts? (Thus thinking) at length he sets his mind free from the virtues and vices subjected to the passions[FN#351] of the Three Worlds, and abides in the discriminative insight into (the nature of) the Anatman[FN#352] only.  By means of that discriminative insight he makes himself pure from lust, and the other (two passions) puts an end to various sorts of Karma, and realizes the Bhutatathata[FN#353] of Anatman.  In brief, he attains to the State of Arhat,[FN#354] has his body reduced to ashes, his intelligence annihilated, and entirely gets rid of sufferings.