United further in sets of four, the lines produce sixty-four figures, which the Chinese consider to be the origin of their characters, since there have been added to these straight lines those which are perpendicular and inclined in different directions.
In Schuking there is also a chapter on Chinese wisdom, where the five elements from which everything is made make their appearance. These are fire, water, wood, metal and earth, which exist all in confusion, and which we should no more than we did before, allow to be principles. The first canon in the law is found in the Schuking, as the naming of the five elements; the second, considerations upon the last, and so it goes on.[12] Universal abstraction with the Chinese thus goes on to what is concrete, although in accordance with an external kind of order only, and without containing anything that is sensuous. This is the principle of all Chinese wisdom and of all the objects of study in China.
3. _The Sect of the Tao-See_. There is yet another separate sect, that of the Tao-See, the followers of which are not mandarins and attached to the state religion, nor are they Buddhists or Lamaics. The originator of this philosophy and the one who was closely connected with it in his life, is Lao-Tsö, who was born in the end of the seventh century before Christ and who was older than Confucius, for this representative of the more political school went to him in order to ask his advice. The book of the Lao-Tsö, Tao-king, is certainly not included in the proper Kings and has not their authority, but it is an important work amongst the Taosts or the followers of reason, who call their rule in life Tao-Tao, which means the observation of the dictates or the laws of reason. They dedicate their lives to the study of reason, and maintain that he who knows reason in its source will possess universal science, remedies for every ill and all virtue; he will also have obtained a supernatural power of being able to fly to heaven and of not dying.[13] His followers say of Lao-Tsö himself that he is Buddha who as man became the ever-existent God. We still have his principal writings; they have been taken to Vienna, and I have seen them there myself. One special passage is frequently taken from them: “Without a name Tao[14] is the beginning of Heaven and Earth, and with a name she is the Mother of the Universe. It is only in her imperfect state that she is considered with affection; who desires to know her must be devoid of passions.” Abel Rémusat says that taken at its best this might be expressed by the Greek in _όογος_. The celebrated passage which is often quoted by the ancients is this,[15] “Reason has brought forth the one; the one has brought forth the two; the two have brought forth the three; and the three have produced the whole world.” In this men have tried to find a reference to the Trinity. “The Universe rests upon the principle of Darkness, the universe embraces the principle of Light,” or “it is embraced by ether;” it can be thus reversed, because the Chinese language has no case inflection, the words merely standing in proximity. Another passage in the same place has this sense, “He whom ye look at and do not see, is named I; thou hearkenest to him and hearest him not, and he is called Hi; thou seekest for him with thy hand and touchest him not, and his name is Weï. Thou meetest him and seest not his head; thou goest behind him and seest not his back.”
These contradictory expressions are called the “chain of reason.” One naturally thinks in quoting these passages of יהרה and of the African kingly name of Juba and also of _Jovis_. This I-hi-weï or I-H-W[16] is further made to signify an absolute vacuity and that which is Nothing; to the Chinese what is highest and the origin of things is nothing, emptiness, the altogether undetermined, the abstract universal, and this is also called Tao or reason. When the Greeks say that the absolute is one, or when men in modern times say that it is the highest existence, all determinations are abolished, and by the merely abstract Being nothing has been expressed excepting this same negation, only in an affirmative form. But if Philosophy has got no further than to such expression, it still stands on its most elementary stage. What is there to be found in all this learning?
B. INDIAN PHILOSOPHY.
If we had formerly the satisfaction of believing in the antiquity of the Indian wisdom and of holding it in respect, we now have ascertained through being acquainted with the great astronomical works of the Indians, the inaccuracy of all figures quoted. Nothing can be more confused, nothing more imperfect than the chronology of the Indians; no people which has attained to culture in astronomy, mathematics, &c., is as incapable for history; in it they have neither stability nor coherence. It was believed that such was to be had in the time of Wikramaditya, who was supposed to have lived about 50 B.C., and under whose reign the poet Kalidasa, author of Sakontala, lived. But further research discovered half a dozen Wikramadityas and careful investigation has placed this epoch in our eleventh century. The Indians have lines of kings and an enormous quantity of names, but everything is vague.
We know how the ancient glory of this land was held in the highest estimation even by the Greeks, just as they knew about the Gymnosophists, who were excellent men, though people ventured to call them otherwise—men who having dedicated themselves to a contemplative life, lived in abstraction from external life, and hence, wandering about in hordes, like the Cynics renounced all ordinary desires. These latter in their capacity as philosophers, were also more especially known to the Greeks, inasmuch as Philosophy is also supposed to exist in this abstraction, in which all the relationships of ordinary life are set aside; and this abstraction is a feature which we wish to bring into prominence and consider.
Indian culture is developed to a high degree, and it is imposing, but its Philosophy is identical with its Religion, and the objects to which attention is devoted in Philosophy are the same as those which we find brought forward in Religion. Hence the holy books or Vedas also form the general groundwork for Philosophy. We know the Vedas tolerably well; they contain principally prayers addressed to the many representations of God, direction as to ceremonials, offerings, &c. They are also of the most various periods; many parts are very ancient, and others have taken their origin later, as, for instance, that which treats of the service of Vishnu. The Vedas even constitute the basis for the atheistical Indian philosophies; these, too, are not wanting in gods, and they pay genuine attention to the Vedas. Indian Philosophy thus stands within Religion just as scholastic Philosophy stands within Christian dogmatism, having at its basis and presupposing the doctrines of the church. Mythology takes the form of incarnation or individualization, from which it might be thought that it would be opposed to Philosophy in its universality and ideality; incarnation is not, however, here taken in so definite a sense, for almost everything is supposed to partake of it, and the very thing that seems to define itself as individuality falls back directly within the mist of the universal. The idea of the Indians more appropriately expressed, is that there is one universal substance which may be laid hold of in the abstract or in the concrete, and out of which everything takes its origin. The summit of man’s attainment is that he as consciousness should make himself identical with the substance, in Religion by means of worship, offerings, and rigid acts of expiation, and in Philosophy through the instrumentality of pure thought.
It is quite recently that we first obtained a definite knowledge of Indian Philosophy; in the main we understand by it religious ideas, but in modern times men have learned to recognize real philosophic writings. Colebrooke,[17] in particular, communicated abstracts to us from two Indian philosophic works, and this forms the first contribution we have had in reference to Indian Philosophy. What Frederick von Schlegel says about the wisdom of the Indians is taken from their religious ideas only. He is one of the first Germans who took up his attention with Indian philosophy, yet his work bore little fruit because he himself read no more than the index to the Ramayana. According to the abstract before mentioned, the Indians possess ancient philosophic systems; one part of these they consider to be orthodox, and those which tally with the Vedas are particularly included; the others are held to be heterodox and as not corresponding with the teaching of the holy books. The one part, which really is orthodox, has no other purpose than to make the deliverances of the Vedas clearer, or to derive from the text of these original treatises an ingeniously thought-out Psychology. This system is called Mimansa, and two schools proceed from it. Distinguished from these there are other systems, amongst which the two chief are those of the Sanc’hya and Nyaya. The former again divides into two parts which are, however, different in form only. The Nyaya is the most developed; it more particularly gives the rules for reasoning, and may be compared to the Logic of Aristotle. Colebrooke has made abstracts from both of these systems, and he says that there are many ancient treatises upon them, and that the _versus memoriales_ from them are very extensive.
1. _The Sanc’hya Philosophy of Capila_. The originator of the Sanc’hya is called Capila, and he was an ancient sage of whom it was said that he was a son of Brahma, and one of the seven great Holy men; others say that he was an incarnation of Vishnu, like his disciple Asuri, and that he was identified with fire. As to the age of the Aphorisms (Sutras) of Capila, Colebrooke can say nothing; he merely mentions that they were already mentioned in other very ancient books, but he does not feel able to say anything definite in the matter. The Sanc’hya is divided into different schools, of which there are two or three, which, however, differ from one another only in a few particulars. It is held to be partly heterodox and partly orthodox.
The real aim of all Indian schools and systems of Philosophy, whether atheistic or theistic, is to teach the means whereby eternal happiness can be attained before, as well as after, death. The Vedas say, “What has to be known is the Soul; it must be distinguished from nature, and hence it will never come again.” That means that it is exempt from metempsychosis and likewise from bodily form, so that it does not after death make its appearance in another body. This blessed condition therefore is, according to the Sanc’hya, a perfect and eternal release from every kind of ill. It reads:—“Through Thought, the true Science, this freedom can be accomplished; the temporal and worldly means of procuring enjoyment and keeping off spiritual or bodily evil are insufficient; even the methods advocated by the Vedas are not effectual for the purpose, and these are found in the revealed form of worship, or in the performance of religious ceremonies as directed in the Vedas.” The offering up of animals is specially valuable as such a means; and in this regard the Sanc’hya rejects the Vedas; such an offering is not pure, because it is connected with the death of animals, and the main tenet in the former is not to injure any animal. Other methods of deliverance from evil are in the excessive acts of penance performed by the Indians, to which a retreat within themselves is added. Now when the Indian thus internally collects himself, and retreats within his own thoughts, the moment of such pure concentration is called Brahma, the one and the clearly supersensuous state, which the understanding calls the highest possible existence. When this is so with me, then am I Brahma. Such a retreat into Thought takes place in the Religion as well as in the Philosophy of the Indians, and they assert with reference to this state of bliss that it is what is highest of all, and that even the gods do not attain to it. Indra, for example, the god of the visible heavens, is much lower than the soul in this life of internal contemplation; many thousand Indras have passed away, but the soul is exempt from every change. The Sanc’hya only differs from Religion in that it has a complete system of thought or logic, and that the abstraction is not made a reduction to what is empty, but is raised up into the significance of a determinate thought. This science is stated to subsist in the correct knowledge of the principles—which may be outwardly perceptible or not—of the material and of the immaterial world.
The Sanc’hya system separates itself into three parts: the method of knowledge, the object of knowledge, and the determinate form of the knowledge of principles.
_a._ As regards the methods of obtaining knowledge, the Sanc’hya says that there are three kinds of evidence possible: first of all, that of perception; secondly, that of inference; thirdly, that of affirmation, which is the origin of all others, such as reverence for authority, a teachable disposition, and tradition. Perception is said to require no explanation. Inference is a conclusion arrived at from the operation of cause and effect, by which one determination merely passes over into a second. There are three forms, because inferences are made either from cause to effect, from effect to cause, or in accordance with different relations of cause and effect. Rain, we may say, is foretold when a cloud is seen to be gathering; fire, when a hill is seen to be smoking; or the movement of the moon is inferred when, at different times, it is observed to be in different places. These are simple, dry relations, originating from the understanding. Under affirmation, tradition or revelation is understood, such as that of the orthodox Vedas; in a wider sense, immediate certainty or the affirmation in my consciousness, and in a less wide sense, an assurance through verbal communication or through tradition is so denominated.
_b._ Of objects of knowledge or of principles, the Sanc’hya gives five-and-twenty; and these I will mention to show the want of order that is in them.
1. Nature, as the origin of everything, is said to be the universal, the material cause, eternal matter, undistinguished and undistinguishable, without parts, productive but without production, absolute substance. 2. Intelligence, the first production of Nature and itself producing other principles, distinguishable as three gods through the efficacy of three qualities, which are Goodness, Foulness and Darkness. These form one person and three gods, namely, Brahma, Vishnu, and Maheswara. 3. Consciousness, personality, the belief that in all perceptions and meditations I am present, that the objects of sense, as well as of intelligence, concern me, in short that I am I. It issues from the power of intelligence, and itself brings forth the following principles. 4-8. Five very subtle particles, rudiments or atoms, which are only perceptible to an existence of a higher order, and not through the senses of men; these proceed from the principle of consciousness, and bring forth on their own account the five elements—space and the first origination of earth, water, fire and air. 9-19. The eleven succeeding principles are the organs of feeling, which are produced by the personality. There are ten external organs, comprising the five senses and five active organs—the organs of the voice, hands and feet, the excretory and genital organs. The eleventh organ is that of the inward sense. 20 to 24. These principles are the five elements brought forth from the earlier-named rudiments—the ether which takes possession of space, air, fire, water and earth. 25. The soul. In this very unsystematic form we see only the first beginnings of reflection, which seem to be put together as a universal. But this arrangement is, to say nothing of being unsystematic, not even intelligent.
Formerly the principles were outside of and successive to one another; their unity is found in the Soul. It is said of the latter that it is not produced, and is not productive; it is individual, and hence there are many souls; it is sentient, eternal, immaterial and unchangeable. Colebrooke here distinguishes between the theistic and atheistic systems of the Sanc’hya, since the former not only admits of individual souls, but also upholds God (Iswara) as the ruler of the world. The knowledge of the soul still remains the principal point. It is through the consideration of nature and through abstraction from nature that the unity of the soul with nature is brought about, just as the lame man and the blind are brought together for the purposes of transport and of guidance—the one being the bearer and being directed (nature?), the other being borne and guiding (soul?). Through the union of Soul and Nature, the creation is effected, and this consists in the development of intelligence and of other principles. This unity is the actual support for that which is, and the means by which it is so maintained. It is at the same time an important consideration that the negation of the object which is contained in thought, is necessary in order to comprehend; this reflection has far more depth than the ordinary talk about immediate consciousness. The view is superficial and perverted which maintains the Easterns to have lived in unity with nature; the soul in its activity, mind, is indeed undoubtedly in relation with nature and in unity with the truth of nature. But this true unity essentially contains the moment of the negation of nature as it is in its immediacy; such an immediate unity is merely the life of animals, the life and perception of the senses. The idea which is present to the Indians is thus indeed the unity of nature and of soul, but the spiritual is only one with nature in so far as it is within itself, and at the same time manifests the natural as negative. As regards the creation, this is further signified. The soul’s desire and end is for satisfaction and freedom, and with this view it is endowed with a subtle environment, in which all the above-mentioned principles are contained, but only in their elementary development. Something of our ideal, or of the implicit is present in this idea; it is like the blossom which is ideally in the bud, and yet is not actual and real. The expression for this is Lingam, the generative power of nature, which holds a high place in the estimation of all Indians. This subtle form, says the Sanc’hya, also assumes a coarse bodily shape, and clothes itself in several garbs; and as a means of preventing the descent into a coarse materiality, philosophic contemplation is recommended.
Hitherto we have observed the abstract principles; the following is to be noticed regarding the creation of the concrete actuality of the universe. The bodily creation consists of the soul habited in a material body; it comprehends eight orders of higher beings and five orders of lower beings, which constitute—with men, who form a single class—fourteen orders, and these are divided into three worlds or classes. The first eight orders have appellations which appear in Indian mythology, viz. Brahma, Prajapatis, Indra, &c.; there are both gods and demi-gods, and Brahma himself is represented here as if he were created. The five lower orders are composed of animals: the four-footed animals are in two classes, birds come third, reptiles, fishes, and insects fourth, and, finally, vegetable and inorganic nature comes fifth. The abode of the eight higher classes is in heaven; they are, it is said, in the enjoyment of that which is good and virtuous, and consequently are happy, though still they are but imperfect and transient; underneath is the seat of darkness or delusion, where beings of the lower orders live; and between is the world of men, where untruth or passion reigns.
Against these three worlds, which have their place in the material creation, the system places yet another creation, and that is the Intellectual, consisting of the powers of understanding and the senses. These last are again divided into four classes, viz. those determinations which impede, those which incapacitate, those which satisfy, and those which perfect the intelligence. 1. Sixty-two of the impeding determinations are adduced; eight kinds of error, as many of opinion or of illusion, ten of passion as being illusion carried to extremity, eighteen of hate or sullenness, and the same of grief. Here there is shown somewhat of an empirical, psychological, and observing mode of treatment. 2. The incapacity of intelligence has again eight-and-twenty variations: injury, want of organs, &c. 3. Satisfaction is either inward or outward. The inward satisfaction is fourfold; the first concerns nature, the whole universal or substantial, and is set forth in the opinion that philosophic knowledge is a modification of the principle of nature itself, with which there is immediately united the anticipation of a liberty given through the act of nature; yet the true liberty is not to be expected as an act of nature, for it is the soul which has to bring forth that liberty through itself and through its thinking activity. The second satisfaction is in the belief of securing liberty through ascetic exercises, pains, torments, and penances. The third has to do with time—the idea that liberty will come in the course of time and without study. The fourth satisfaction is obtained in a belief in luck—in believing that liberty depends on fate. The external mode of obtaining satisfaction relates to continence from enjoyment, but continence from sensuous motives, such as dislike to the unrest of acquisition, and fear of the evil consequences of enjoyment. 4. There are, again, several means of perfecting the intelligence adduced, and, amongst others, there is the direct psychological mode of perfecting mind, as is seen in the act of reasoning, in friendly converse, and so on. This we may find, indeed, in our applied logic.
There is still somewhat to be remarked as to the main points of the system. The Sanc’hya, and likewise the other Indian systems of Philosophy, occupy themselves particularly with the three _qualities_ (Guna) of the absolute Idea, which are represented as substances and as modifications of nature. It is noteworthy that in the observing consciousness of the Indians it struck them that what is true and in and for itself contains three determinations, and the Notion of the Idea is perfected in three moments. This sublime consciousness of the trinity, which we find again in Plato and others, then went astray in the region of thinking contemplation, and retains its place only in Religion, and there but as a Beyond. Then the understanding penetrated through it, declaring it to be senseless; and it was Kant who broke open the road once more to its comprehension. The reality and totality of the Notion of everything, considered in its substance, is absorbed by the triad of determinations; and it has become the business of our times to bring this to consciousness. With the Indians, this consciousness proceeded from sensuous observation merely, and they now further define these qualities as follows: The first and highest is with them the Good (Sattva); it is exalted and illuminating—allied to joy and felicity—and piety predominates within it. It prevails in fire, and therefore flames rise up and sparks fly upwards; if it has ascendency in men, as it does have in the eight higher orders, it is the origin of virtue. This also is the universal—throughout and in every aspect the affirmative—in abstract form. The second and mediate quality is deceit or passion (Najas, Tejas) which for itself is blind; it is that which is impure, harmful, hateful; it is active, vehement, and restless, allied to evil and misfortune, being prevalent in the air, on which account the wind moves transversely; amongst living beings it is the cause of vice. The third and last quality is darkness (Tamas); it is inert and obstructive, allied to care, dullness, and disappointment, predominating in earth and water, and hence these fall down and tend ever downwards. With living beings stupidity takes its origin in this. The first quality is thus the unity with itself; the second the manifestation or the principle of difference, desire, disunion, as wickedness; the third, however, is mere negation, as in mythology it is concretely represented in the form of Siva, Mahadeva, or Maheswara, the god of change or destruction. As far as we are concerned, the important distinction is that the third principle is not the return to the first which Mind and Idea demand, and which is effected by the removal of the negation in order to effect a reconciliation with itself and to go back within itself. With the Indians the third is still change and negation.
These three qualities are represented as the essential being of nature. The Sanc’hya says, “We speak of them as we do of the trees in a wood.” Yet this is a bad simile, for the wood is but an abstract universal, in which the individuals are independent. In the religious ideas of the Vedas, where these qualities also appear as Trimurti, they are spoken of as if they were successive modifications, so that “Everything was darkness first, then received the command to transform itself, and in this manner the form”—which, however, is a worse one—“of movement and activity (foulness) was assumed, until finally, by yet another command from Brahma, the form of goodness was adopted.”
Further determinations of the intelligence in respect of these qualities follow. It is said that eight kinds of intelligence are counted, of which four pertain to what is good:—virtue first, science and knowledge second, thirdly, freedom from passion, which, may have either an external and sensuous motive—the repugnance to disturbance—or be of an intellectual nature, and emanate from the conviction that nature is a dream, a mere jugglery and sham; the fourth is power. This last is eight-fold, and hence eight special qualities are given as being present; viz. the power to contract oneself into a quite small form, for which everything shall be penetrable; the power to expand into a gigantic body; the power to become light enough to be able to mount to the sun on a sunbeam; the possession of unlimited power of action in the organs, so that with the finger-tips the moon may be touched; irresistible will, so that, for instance, one may dive into the earth as easily as in the water; mastery over all living and lifeless existence; the power to change the course of nature; and the power to perform everything that is wished. “The feeling that such transcendent power,” Colebrooke goes on, “is within the reach of man in his life is not peculiar to the Sanc’hya sect, but is common to all systems and religious ideas, and such a power is in good faith ascribed to many holy men and Brahmins in dramas and popular narratives.”
Sensuous evidence is of no account as opposed to this, for with the Indian, perception of the senses is, generally speaking, absent: everything adopts the form of imaginary images, every dream is esteemed just as much as truth and actuality. The Sanc’hya ascribes this power to man, in so far as he elevates himself through the working of his thought into inward subjectivity. Colebrooke says, “The Yoga-sastra names in one of its four chapters a number of acts by which such power may be attained; these are exemplified by a profound meditation, accompanied by holding back the breath and inactivity of the senses, while a fixed position is constantly preserved. By means of such acts the adept reaches the knowledge of all that is past as well as future; he has learned to divine the thoughts of others, to have the strength of elephants, the courage of lions, the swiftness of the wind, the power to fly in the air, to swim in the water, to dive into the earth, to behold every possible world in one moment, and to accomplish other wonderful deeds. But the quickest mode of reaching happiness through deep contemplation is that worship of God which consists in ever murmuring the mystic name of God, ‘Om.’” This idea is a very general one.