A History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature, so far as it illustrates the Primitive Religion of the Brahmans c8.24

c8.24

Now if we inquire how Buddha’s doctrines were met by the Brahmans, it is true that here and there in their philosophical works they have endeavoured to overthrow some of his metaphysical axioms by an appeal to reason. An attempt of this kind we have, for instance, in Vâchaspati Miśra’s commentary on the Vedânta Sûtras. In commenting on the tenet of Buddha, that “ideas like those of being, and not-being, &c., do not admit of discussion,”¹ Vâchaspati observes that the very fact of speaking of these ideas, includes the possibility of their conception; nay, that to affirm they do not admit of reasoning involves an actual reasoning on them, and proves that the mind can conceive the idea of being as different from that of not-being.