Note (return) — SA@NKARA'S INTRODUCTION (continued 4)

With reference to this doctrine we make the following remarks.—Those two aggregates, constituting two different classes, and having two different causes which the Bauddhas assume, viz. the aggregate of the elements and elementary things whose cause the atoms are, and the aggregate of the five skandhas whose cause the skandhas are, cannot, on Bauddha principles, be established, i.e. it cannot be explained how the aggregates are brought about. For the parts constituting the (material) aggregates are devoid of intelligence, and the kindling (abhijvalana) of intelligence depends on an aggregate of atoms having been brought about previously387. And the Bauddhas do not admit any other permanent intelligent being, such as either an enjoying soul or a ruling Lord, which could effect the aggregation of the atoms. Nor can the atoms and skandhas be assumed to enter on activity on their own account; for that would imply their never ceasing to be active388. Nor can the cause of aggregation be looked for in the so-called abode (i.e. the âlayavijñâna-pravâha, the train of self-cognitions); for the latter must be described either as different from the single cognitions or as not different from them. (In the former case it is either permanent, and then it is nothing else but the permanent soul of the Vedântins; or non-permanent;) then being admitted to be momentary merely, it cannot exercise any influence and cannot therefore be the cause of the motion of the atoms389. (And in the latter case we are not further advanced than before.)—For all these reasons the formation of aggregates cannot be accounted for. But without aggregates there would be an end of the stream of mundane existence which presupposes those aggregates.