hand, that they
are not positively definable, and, on the other hand, that they are
eternal. Of what is not real neither eternity nor non-eternity can be
predicated, since the distinction of subjects and predicates of
attribution is founded entirely on real things. Anything with regard to
which that distinction holds good we conclude to be a real thing, such
as jars and the like are, not a mere undefinable negation.

25. And on account of remembrance.

The philosopher who maintains that all things are momentary only would
have to extend that doctrine to the perceiving person (upalabdh/ri/)
also; that is, however, not possible, on account of the remembrance
which is consequent on the original perception. That remembrance can
take place only if it belongs to the same person who previously made the
perception; for we observe that what one man has experienced is not
remembered by another man. How, indeed, could there arise the conscious
state expressed in the sentences, 'I saw that thing, and now I see this
thing,' if the seeing person were not in both cases the same? That the
consciousness of recognition takes place only in the case of the
observing and remembering subject being one, is a matter known to every
one; for if there were, in the two cases, different subjects, the state
of consciousness arising in the mind of the remembering person would be,
'_I_ remember; another person made the observation.' But no such state
of consciousness does arise.--When, on the other hand, such a state of
consciousness does arise, then everybody knows that the person who made
the original observation, and the person who remembers, are different
persons, and then the state of consciousness is expressed as follows, 'I
remember that that other person saw that and that.'--In the case under
discussion, however, the Vaina/s/ika himself--whose state of
consciousness is, 'I saw that and that'--knows that there is one
thinking subject only to which the original perception as well as the
remembrance belongs, and does not think of denying that the past
perception belonged to himself, not any more than he denies that fire is
hot and gives light.

As thus one agent is connected with the two moments of perception and
subsequent remembrance, the Vaina/s/ika has necessarily to abandon the
doctrine of universal momentariness. And if he further recognises all
his subsequent successive cognitions, up to his last breath, to belong
to one and the same su