Page:A History of Indian Philosophy Vol 1.djvu/330

3 1 4 The Nyiiya- Vaiseika Philosophy [ClI. or air is apprehended as having odour on account of the presence of earth materials. The fourth is sparsa (touch), that quality which can be ap- prehended only by the skin. There are three kinds of touch, cold, hot, neither hot nor cold. Sparsa belongs to kiti; ap, tejas, and vayu. The fifth sabda (sound) is an attribute of akasa. Had there been no akasa there would have been no sound. The sixth is sarpkhya (number), that entityof quality belonging to things by virtue of which we can count them as one, two, three, etc. The conception of numbers two, three, etc. is due to a relative oscillatory state of the mind (apekiibuddlU:); thus when there are two jugs before my eyes, I have the notion-This is one jug and that is another jug. This is called apekabuddhi; then in the two jugs there arises the quality of twoness (dvit'ua) and then an indeterminate perception (llirvikalpa-dvitva-gzt1Ja) of dvitva in us and then the determinate perceptions that there are the two jugs. The conceptions of other numbers as well as of many arise in a similar manner l . The seventh is parimiti (measure), that entity of quality in things by virtue of which we perceive them as great or small and speak of them as such. The measure of the partless atoms is called parima?zt;lala parz"1}liila; it is eternal, and it cannot gene- rate the measure of any other thing. Its measure is its own abso- lutely; when two atoms generate a dyad (dvYa1Jltka) it is not the measure of the atom that generates the aI]u (atomic) and the hrasva (small) measure of the dyad molecule (dvYa1Juka), for then the size (pan.mli?za) of it would have been still smaller than the measure of the atom (Parimaw!ala), whereas the measure of the dyal)uka is of a different kind, namely the small (/zraS'i}a) 2. Of course two atoms generate a dyad, but then the number (sarpkhya) of the atom should be regarded as bringing forth a new kind of measure, namely the small (/zrasva) measure in the dyads. So again when three dyads (dYaI:mka) compose a trya1).uka the number and not the measure" small " 1 This is distinctively a Vaiseika view introduced by Prasastapiida. Nyaya seems to be silcnt on this matter. See Sankara Misra's Upaskiira, VII. ii. 8. 2 I t should be noted that the atomic measure appears in two forms as eternal as in .. paramiil)us" and non-eternal as in the dvyal)uka. The parimaQlala parimiiI:1a is thus a variety of al)uparimiiQa. The aQuparimiil)a and the hrasvaparimal)a represent the two dimensions of the measure of dvyal)ukas as mahat and dirgha are with reference to tryalUkas. See Nyayakamb.lli, p. I.H.