The System of the Vedanta according to Badarayana's Brahma-Sutras and Cankara's Commentary c8.s1.t2: 2. Arguments of the Materialists against the Immortality of the Soul

c8.s1.t2.1

"Some, namely those materialists (*lokâyatika*) who see the "Self in the body only, believe that there is no Self which "persists beyond the body; they assume that consciousness "though indiscoverable in the external elements, earth, etc., “taken individually and collectively, is contained in them when they take the form of the body; therefore they maintain that consciousness proceeds from them in the form of intellect, just as the power of intoxication [from fermenting matter], and that man is only a body which is distinguished by this consciousness. On the other hand they deny a Self which persists beyond the body, by virtue of which consciousness is in the body and which is capable of entering into heaven or into salvation; on the contrary they assume that the body alone is the conscious being and the Self, and cite as a proof that this conscious being only continues as long as the body. For when anything exists only as long as something else exists, and ceases to exist with it, this is completely expressed by terming it a quality of the other, just as heat and light are qualities of fire. It is just the same with breath, motion, spirit, memory, etc. which are considered qualities of the soul by believers in the soul; for they too are perceived only within the body and not without it, and as no bearer of these qualities which reaches beyond the body can be proved, therefore they can be nothing but qualities of the body. Therefore the Self does not persist beyond the body” (p. 954, 5--955, 2).