A Constructive Survey of Upanishadic Philosophy c4.s3.19.3

c4.s3.19.3

We are merely like little dolls, and throw out our hands and feet according as the great Thread-puller, Ātman, wishes to make us dance (III. 7). The Ātman is the ultimate light of man ; all other lights are lights by sufferance. When Ātman is realised as the light of man, one reaches self-consciousness (IV. 3. 1-6). The Ātman alone is the ultimate hearer, seer, thinker : there is no thinker beside Him (III. 4. 2). The Ātman perceives himself. Only when there is a duality, then one may see another ; but when One alone is, processes of perception and thought are alike impossible, and we are reduced to a state of solipsism (II. 4. 14). But Yājñavalkya takes care to say that the organs of perception of the percipient do not cease to function. That, from the epistemological side, is the relieving feature of his solipsism (IV. 3. 23-30). In psychology, Yājñavalkya teaches, like other Upanishadic philosophers, that when the state of dream occurs, the Ātman spreads out his own light (IV. 3. 9). The Ātman in this state moves out from his nest, guarding it nevertheless with breath (IV. 3. 12). It must be remembered, however, that the Ātman only seems to move, or only seems to imagine in the state of dream, and does not really move or imagine (IV. 3. 7). Yājñavalkya advises that when a man is dreaming, let no one wake him up suddenly, for fear, apparently, that the Soul may depart (IV. 3. 14). A father in that state is not a father; a mother, a mother; a thief a thief;