Sarvadarshanasangraha 2.56

2.56

evaṃ śūnyaṃ śūnyam ity api bhāvanīyam/ svapne jāgaraṇe ca na mayā dṛṣṭam idaṃ rajatādīti viśiṣṭaniṣedhasyopalambhāt/ yadi dṛṣṭaṃ sat tadā tadviśiṣṭasya darśanasyedaṃtāyā adhiṣṭhānasya ca tasminn adhyastasya rajatatvādes tatsaṃbandhasya ca samavāyādeḥ sattvaṃ syāt/ na caitad iṣṭaṃ kasyacid vādinaḥ/ na cārdhajaratīyam ucitam/ na hi kukkuṭyā eko bhāgaḥ pākāyāparo bhāgaḥ prasavāya kalpyatām iti kalpyate/ tasmād adhyastādhiṣṭhānatatsaṃbandhadarśanadraṣṭṝṇāṃ madhya ekasyānekasya vā asattve niṣedhaviṣayatvena sarvasyāsattvaṃ balād āpated iti bhagavatopadiṣṭe mādhyamikās tāvad uttamaprajñā ittham acīkathan: bhikṣupādaprasāraṇanyāyena kṣaṇabhaṅgādyabhidhānamukhena sthāyitvānukūlavedanīyatvānugatatvasarvasatyatvabhramavyāvartanena sarvaśūnyatāyām eva paryavasānam/ atas tattvaṃ sadasadubhayānubhayātmakacatuṣkoṭivinirmuktaṃ śūnyam eva/ tathā hi/ yadi ghaṭādeḥ sattvaṃ svabhāvas tarhi kārakavyāpāravaiyarthyam/ asattvaṃ svabhāva iti pakṣe prācīna eva doṣaḥ prāduḥṣyāt/ yathoktam:

In like manner we must hold that all is void, and void alone. For we are conscious of a determinate negation. This silver or the like has not been seen by me in sleeping or waking. If what is seen were (really) existent, then reality would pertain to the corresponding act of vision, to the (nacre, &c.), which is the basis of its particular nature (or haecceity), to the silver, &c., illusorily superposed upon that basis, to the connection between them, to the co-inherence, and so forth: a supposition not entertained by any disputant. Nor is a semi-effete existence admissible. No one imagines that one-half of a fowl may be set apart for cooking, and the other half for laying eggs. The venerated Buddha, then, having taught that of the illusorily superposed (silver, &c.), the basis (nacre, &c.), the connection between them, the act of vision, and the videns, if one or more be unreal it will perforce ensue that all are unreal, all being equally objects of the negation; the Mādhyamikas excellently wise explain as follows, viz., that the doctrine of Buddha terminates in that of a total void (universal baselessness or nihilism) by a slow progression like the intrusive steps of a mendicant, through the position of a momentary flux, and through the (gradual) negation of the illusory assurances of pleasurable sensibility, of universality, and of reality.

The ultimate principle, then, is a void emancipated from four alternatives, viz., from reality, from unreality, from both (reality and unreality), and from neither (reality nor unreality). To exemplify this: If real existence were the nature of a water-pot and the like, the activity of its maker (the potter) would be superfluous.

If non-existence be its nature the same objection will accrue; as it is said—