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request, you have been gracious enough to make that a matter of humorous jokes, and try to make us ashamed of our question. When we say " ***the double murdered, the treble, not the double, and in no case the spiritual one," then in the sense, by treble you should have understood the Anna-maya, but instead of so doing you are disgusted with the sentence, not only this sentence but also another one, in regard to which you say, "why should he then use against his own argument the term laya?" How can we erase the word out of Kosha (dictionary)? It would be better to understand us by our own idea and not through your own interpretations.
"There are two methods of investigation," says Spinoza, "the vulgar and the scientific. The one starts from principles which have been accepted without examination, which are not, therefore, clearly understood. The other starts from principles clearly defined and accurately known. It is the latter only which can lead to true knovfledge." We fear, our venerable friends have followed the first method, which we shall try to prove by and by. ***
Before doing this, however, may we be permitted to ask an answer to our question—Is spirit and matter the same thing? Or whether Prakriti, Shakti, and Spirit are the same things? Unless Prakriti be the same with spirit, how can the former be eternal, since two eternals cannot exist at the same time, and the belief in two eternals is against the fundamental truths of the Adwaita Philosophy,*[1] as embodied in the aphorism ek meva dwitiyam. And matter has attributes, such as color, form, sound, touch, sight, taste and smell; but the spirit has none. Matter is dead (jad), Spirit is living (chaitanya); matter is temporary and subject to change, and spirit is eternal; matter is partial, and spirit is universal.†[2] But what is
- ↑ * This is precisely the question we have been asking; and also the reason why, knowing that matter is indestructible, as also spirit or rather energy—we say with all the esoteric Adwaitees that matter and spirit are one—Ed.
- ↑ † See Mr. Subba Row's reply. While we mean Cosmic, indestructible matter, the Swami speaks of objective and differentiated matter!—Ed.
