Padartha Guna Chintamani Pdf Free Download
Julia Heaslet
The most important addition to the Notes was a literal translation of the text of the Sangraha printed in italics at the top of each section, which will be found useful to students. Ambiguities and mistakes left in the hurry of the first edition have now been removed as far as possible, and many passages in the notes have been re-written for the purpose. Some paragraphs had to be renumbered and some sections have been rearranged. Portion of the preface in the first edition dealing with the author has been placed after the Introduction, and another portion deal- ing with Mss. collated for the text has been transferred to the end as Appendix C. The Index at the end is a new feature added in this edition.
tional foot-notes have been inserted at the proper places. The discovery of unknown Jain and Buddhistic literature in India as well as in Tibet and China by the researches of distinguished scholars like Dr. Sarat Chandra Das and Mah- mahopadhyaya Satisa Chandra Vidyabhushana is likely to throw new light on many dark spots in the history of Indian philosophy, and many of our current notions are also likely to be altered. All speculations on this subject must therefore be accepted as only provisional at present. It would be a very interesting and instructive study to trace the gradual development of many philosophical problems, such as the atomic theory, the identity of cause and effect, the Nyaya syllogism and the notion of Abhva. But until fuller materials are available, it will be worse than useless to indulge in idle guesses. It is now fully recognized that Indian philosophical systems are not the creations of individual promulgators, but organic growths from out of various currents of thoughts germinating through ages and collected in the Brahmanas the Aranyakas and the more ancient Smritis and Puranas. A critical and comparative study of these philosophies will assuredly reveal the lines of this growth as well as its reaction on the religious development of the Hindus. It is to be hoped that Indian scholars will devote greater attention to the study of this aspect of Indian philosophy.
An attempt has been made in the Introduction prefixed to this edition to trace the gradual development of Nyaya and Vaiseshika literature from the age of the Stras upto the latest period. A historical sketch like this is sure to give the students a better notion of these systems than any amount of study of isolated works. The attempt is of course only tentative, but it at least opens a vast field for inquiry which may be profitably pursued in future. It was at first intended to discuss some of the more important doc- trines of Nyaya and Vaiseshika systems in the Introduc- tion, especially with reference to their evolution and bear- ing on the general course of thought in India. The task, however, was found to be too vast for such a work as the present and the plan had to be abandoned for want of space; but a few hints of the kind will be found in the notes in their proper places.
That it is possible to write a history of the Nyaya and Vaiseshika philosophies will be readily admitted; but a history of philosophy, such as it ought to be, presupposes a good many things, which may not find universal acceptance. It assumes, for instance, that the Indian systems of philoso- phy were gradually evolved out of a few broad principles by a succession of writers and under particular circumstances. The idea that philosophical speculations in India were the spontaneous brain-creations of a few mystic Brahmans, dreaming high thoughts in lonely forests and totally unaffected by the passing events of the world. must be discarded once for all. There is no reason why philosophy in India should have followed a different course from what it did in Greece and other civilized countries. Systems of philosophy are as much liable to be influenced by past aud contemporary events as any other branch. of science or literature; and IndianIntroduction.
philosophy has been deepened by the accounts left by Plato, Xenophon and Thucydides. Systems of philosophy as well as individual doctrines are never the products of personal caprice or of mere accident; they are evolved out of a long chain of antecedent causes. They are in fact the tangible manifestations of various latent forces which mould the character and history of the nation. There could have been no Aristotle without a Plato or a Socrates, and no Socrates without the Sophists. A knowledge of this sequence is therefore essential to a true appreciation of every system and every doctrine, an isolated study of them being either insufficient or misleading. Besides, theories and schools are often the work not of one individual or of one age, but of a succession of thinkers who fashion and refashion them as it were until they become worthy of general acceptance. Such seems to have been the case with doctrines of God, of cansality and of creation, in India as well as in Greece. The true aim of a history of philosophy may be explained in the words of Zeller:-
The systems of philosophy, however peculiar and self- dependent they may be, thus appear as the members of a larger historical inter-connection; in respect to this alone can they be perfectly understood; the further we follow it the more the individuals become united to a whole of his- torical development, and the problem arises not merely of explaining this whole by means of the particulars condi- tioning it, but likewise of explaining these moments by one another and consequently the individual by the whole.'
lie hidden under a heavy load of scholastic surplusage. They have not the halo of religion and mysticism which makes the Vedanta and the other theological systems so attractive to students of Hindu philosophy, while the scholasticsubtleties of the most modern Nyaya writers, such as Siromani and Gadadhara, inspire positive terror in untrained minds. If the Nyaya and Vaiseshika systems, therefore, are to be popularized and their value to be recognized, it is necessary to divest them of their excrescences.
A large mass of rubbish is to be found in the works of modern Naiya- yikas, and the task of extracting the pure ore out of it is very difficult; but it is worth performing. The process of sifting and cleaning will have to he repeated several times before we can really understand some of the profoundest conceptions that are interwoven in these systems. Philosophy is the stronghold of Hinduism, and the system of Nyuya forms as it were the back-bone of Hindu philosophy. Every other system accepts the fundamental principles of Nyiya logic, while even where there are differences, the dissentients often borrow the very arguments and phraseology of the Ngaya for their own purpose. A study of the Nyya as well as Vaiseshike systems is therefore a necessary step to a proper understanding of most of the systems. It forms as it were an introduction to the general study of philosophy, and hence no scholar who would seek the truth in the latter can afford to neglect them.
Among the numerous systems of philosophy that have been evolved in India during the last three thonsand years. the Nyaya and Vaišeshika occupy a unique position, both on account of their cardinal doctrines and of the mass of learning that has accumulated around them. A general view of these doctrines will not, therefore, be out of place in a sketch like this. Nyaya, which is the more compact and perhaps also the more modern of the two, is much more a system of dialectics than one of philosophy. The aphorisms of Gotama and the works founded on them treat no doubt of metaphysical and theological questions occasionally, but
they come in rather as digressions than as inseparable parts of the system. The Vaiseshika, ou the other hand, is essentially a system of metaphysics with a disquisition ou logic skilfully dovetailed into it by later writers. It is these peculiarities which have earned them the name of logical systems and which distinguish them from each other as well as from other systems of Indian philosophy. These peculi- arities must be carefully noted, for inattention to them has led many to misunderstand the true scope and function of these systems.'
A remarkable feature of both the Nyaya and the Vaiseshi- ka systems, as in fact of all the Indian systems of philoso- phy, is the religious motive which underlies them. Religion is the incentive to all these speculations, and religion is also the test of their truth and utility. Salvation is the goal which both Kanda and Gotama promise the people as the reward of a thorough knowledge of their respective sys-
tems. Amidst all the differences one idea appears to be common to all the ancient Indian systems, namely, that knowledge is the door and the only door to salvation. Opin- ions only differ as to what things are worth knowing. Conse- quently the bitterest controversies have raged among these rivals as to what things ought to be known for the speedy at- tainment of salvation. These controversies usually take the form of attacks on the rival classifications of categories as be ing either defective or superfluous or illogical. Another effect of the religious character of these systems is the discussion of many apparently irrelevant topics which have made them look somewhat heterogeneous and unsystematic. The many digressions in the works of Gotama and Kanada as well as their followers are easily understood if we look to the bearing which those topics have upon the end and aim of philosophy. Take for instance the controversy about non-eternity of sound. What has the eternity of sound to
to do with logic? Au inference would be just as right or wrong whether the words conveying it are eternal or not. But the question of the eternity of sound is vitally connected with the infallibility of the Vedas which are final authority in all matters of doubt; and all orthodox systems, therefore, must have their say on the point. We thus find that questious of the most diverse character are discussed wherever the context leads to them while others more closely related to the subject are neglect- ed. Each system has consequently become a mixture as it were of the fragments of several sciences such as logic, metaphysics, psychology, and theology. This is not how- ever a weakness as some superficial critics have supposed. It arises from the very conception of a Daršana, and could never have been avoided by those who in these systems sought to provide a complete guide as it were to the road to salvation. Indian philosophy is not singular in this respect. Everywhere philosophy grows out of religious instincts. The sense of dependence on supernatural powers and a desire to conciliate them were the first incentives
b1e95dc632