Studies in the History of Sanskrit Poetics v2.c84.48

v2.c84.48

The process of inference in poetry by which the unexpressed may be thus reached is presumably the ordinary process of syllogistic reasoning, which consists in the invariable concomitance (*vyāpti*) of the middle (*liṅga*) and the major (*liṅgin*) terms. The *dhvani* or suggested sense is the *liṅgin*, and its suggestors (viz., word and sense) are apparently its *liṅga*. The invariable concomitance is ascertained in three ways, viz., by *anupalabdhi* (non-cognition), *tādātmya* (identity) and *tadutpatti* (causation). In reply to Mahimabhatta's position, it has been shewn that none of these means of proving a syllogism is applicable to establishing the invariable concomitance between the *liṅga* *śabdārthau* and the *liṅgin* *dhvani*. The non-cognition of word and sense does not prove the existence of *dhvani*; for non-cognition only proves that *liṅgin* which consists of the absence of something. That a jar is absent can be proved from its non-cognition. But here the *liṅgin* *dhvani* does not consist of the absence of anything. Therefore the *hetu* is vitiated, and the non-cognition of word and sense can only prove *their* absence, but not that of *dhvani*. There can be no identity, again, between the suggested sense (*dhvani*) and that which suggests it (*śabda* and *artha*); for the suggested meaning is essentially different from the expressed, and comes out prominently by keeping the latter in subordinate position. Similarly, the test of *tadutpatti* or causation does not apply, for here the word and sense cannot be regarded as being caused by the suggested sense, in the same way as the smoke, which proves the existence of fire, can be taken as being produced from the fire itself.