The Samkhya System: A History of the Samkhya Philosophy c11.17

c11.17

From the principle of causality is deduced the fact that the ultimate basis of the empirical universe is the unevolved, Avyakta. Individual things are all limited in magnitude. and this is incompatible with the nature of the source of the universe. All individual things are analogous one to another, and therefore no one can be regarded as the final source of the other. Moreover, as they all come into being from a source, they cannot constitute that source. Further, an effect must differ from its cause, though it must consist of the cause, and therefore the empiric universe cannot itself be the final cause, but must be the product of some ultimate cause. The obvious difficulty that the unevolved cannot be perceived is met with the argument that its fine nature renders it imperceptible, just as other things, of whose existence there is no doubt, cannot be perceived; either because of their too great distance or proximity, through the intervention of a third object, through admixture with similar matter, through the presence of some more powerful sensation, or the blindness or other defect of the senses or the mind of the observer.