Page:The Tamils Eighteen Hundred Years Ago.djvu/243

Rh with form: with both consciousness and form: as human beings, gods, or beasts.

“The three (divisions of) time are :—the past which ought to be said to include (the stages of) ignorance and action: the present which may be described as including consciousness, name and form, the senses, contact, sensation, desire, attachment, existence and birth: the future which is said to include birth, disease, old age, death, grief, lamentation, dejection and despair. The defects are Desire, Attachment and Ignorance. Action and existence constitute our (good and evil) deeds.

“Consciousness, Name and Form, The senses, Contact, Sensation, Birth, Old-age, Disease, and Death are the natural Result (of our deeds).

“All sentient being who suffer by the above Defects, Deeds and Results are temporary. No being has an (immortal) soul. To understand thus (and realize these truths) is salvation.

“Consciousness, Name and Form, the Senses, Contact, Sensation, Birth, Disease, Old-age, Death, Grief, Lamentation, Dejection and Despair are (four) Distempers. The cause of these Distempers is Ignorance, Action, Desire, Attachment and Existence.

“Birth is painful; attachment is its cause: Release is joyful; absence of Attachment is its cause. These are the Four Truths.

“Form (or organised body), Sensation, Perception, Discrimination and Consciousness are the Five Aggregate (Skandhas).

“The six modes of expression may be explained as follows:- Words denote collection, continuance, excess of a quality and division; arid they are used to express what exists, what does not exist; a truth about what exists; an untruth about what does not exist; an untruth about what exists; or a truth about what does not exist. (Words such as) body, water, country, denote a collection. The (word) Paddy which is used for the grain, sprout, stalk, etc., of rice denotes a continuance (of phenomena). (The words) cessation, appearance and growth, denote the excess of quality, (in the successive stages of an object). When several letters are spoken of as a ‘word’ or several days are specified as a ‘month,’ it denotes Division. Sensation. is ‘what exists.’ A