大乘起信論裂網疏 3.57

3.57

Because the unshared ignorance of the seventh consciousness does not truly know the oneness of the true dharma, it falsely perceives arising and ceasing within the truly permanent. Moreover, unable to know that [dharmas] do not abide for an instant and are in their very essence quiescent and extinct, it falsely perceives continuity within arising and ceasing. Therefore, thought-moment after thought-moment it inwardly clings to the eighth as the self and dharmas, causing it to receive perfuming and hold seeds, and to incur fruits of maturation (vipāka). Thought-moment after thought-moment it serves as the basis for the outer six transforming consciousnesses, causing them to recall the past and discriminate the future. If not for the seventh's innate grasping at dharmas serving as the basis for the prior six, then the eighth consciousness would not receive the perfuming of the prior seven and hold tainted seeds, because without the perfuming agents of the prior seven, there would be no eighth as the object of perfuming. The sixth consciousness would also not recall the past and discriminate the future, because without the seventh and eighth as the supported basis, there would be no sixth as that which relies on them. Therefore this seventh is directly named the 'continuous consciousness'. As the *Commentary* quotes the *Dharmadvāra-sūtra*: 'Because the seventh consciousness has extraordinary power, at times it performs the function of retaining and storing, and at times it performs [the function of] being the basis of discrimination.' This is what it refers to. If one contemplates that the mind-nature does not abide for an instant and is in its very essence quiescent and extinct, then continuity is without the mark of continuity, and one then attains entry into the aspect of tathatā.