Mahabharata 12.196.2

12.196.2

yathendriyārthānyugapatsamastānnāvekṣate kṛtsnamatulyakālam |
yathābalaṃ saṃcarate sa vidvāṃstasmātsa ekaḥ paramaḥ śarīrī || 2 ||

"Manu said, 'The mind united with the senses, recollects after a long time the impressions of the objects received in the past. When the senses are all suspended (in respect of their functions), the Supreme (the Soul), in the form of the Understanding, exists in its own true nature. When the Soul (at such a time) does not in the least regard all those objects of the senses in respect of their simultaneity or the reverse in point of time but mustering them from all directions holds them before it together, it necessarily happens that he wanders among all things that are incongruous. He is, therefore, the (silent) Witness. Hence the Soul encased in body is something having a distinct and independent existence. There is Rajas, there is Tamas, and there is Sattwa, the third. There are again three states of the understanding, viz., waking, dreaming, and sound sleep. The Soul has knowledge of the pleasures and pains, which are all contradictory, of those states, and which partake of the nature of the threefold attributes first mentioned. The Soul enters the senses like the wind entering the fire in a piece of wood. One cannot behold the form of the Soul by one's eye, nor can the sense of touch, amongst the senses, apprehend it. The Soul is not, again, an object of apprehension by the ear. It may, however, be seen by the aid of the Srutis and the instructions of the wise.