The System of the Vedanta according to Badarayana's Brahma-Sutras and Cankara's Commentary c6.s3.t4.2

c6.s3.t4.2

Prefatory Remark. When we consider the weakness and frailty of man's intellect, we can only wonder at the unanimity with which, in Indian, Greek and modern philosophy, Intelligence is ascribed as an essential attribute to “the Thing-in-itself.” It is well worth while to follow out the motives which have led the thinkers of ancient and modern times to declare so feeble a faculty, which works only intermittently, is bound up with organic life and perishes with it, to be the essence of the being of Beings. These motives are especially clearly seen in the deeply founded structure of the Vedânta philosophy. Metaphysics must above all seek a firm and immovable point of certainty, in order to attack the subject, and this can only be found in the consciousness of the philosophising subject; hence the Cartesian: *cogito, ergo sum*, and the corresponding statement of our work, which we have given above p. 127 ff. Here, within our own Self, we gain an infallible guide to the absolute Being which we are seeking: that which cannot be laid aside must also be the imperishable, the unchangeable must also be that which lies at the basis of every thing changeable, a conviction, which is most clearly expressed by calling the Principle of all Being the *Âtman*, that is, the Self. We reach it as, in the manner described above p. 58, and in note 29, we gradually separate from our "I" everything which is "not-I," hence not only the outer world, the body and its organs, but also the whole apparatus of *Buddhi* or intellect (the *indriyas* and the *manas*). What remains, should consequently be spoken of only as unconscious; but they could not go so far, without removing the whole phenomenon from the region of perceptibility. Consciousness, therefore, in which all this process of elimination proceeds, was left as the terminus, so that not only was the necessity avoided of abandoning, along with the organs of perception, their function also,—perception,—but also the very noteworthy objections of the adversary, which we shall presently detail, were set at defiance.