Page:The Vedanta-sutras, with the Sri-bhashya of Ramanujacharya.djvu/108

 Adhik. L Srtt. /.] SRI-BHASHYA. 15

increase of saliva (/'. c. the quality of goodness) (an increase) resulting from the destruction of rajas and tamas (or the qualities of passion and darkness respectively) which form the roots of sin ; and that, therefore, having in view (only) this use (of works), it is declared (in the scripture) - -" Brlhmanas desire to know &c." _Brih. Up. IV. 4. 22.]. Hence, .on account of the uselessness of the knowledge of works, the aforesaid fourfold means alone has to be stated to be the necessary antecedent (of the enquiry into the Brahman).

Regarding this (view) it is said (in reply) as follows : The statement that the cessation of ignorance in itself constitutes final release, and that it results solely from the knowledge of the Brahman is admitted (by us). It has (however) to be discriminated, of what form that knowledge is which it is desired to enjoin, by means of Vedantic passages, for the purpose of removing ignorance whether what is to be learnt fro n n. scriptural sentence is merely the knowledge of the syntactical meaning of that s-en- te:ic3, or whether it is knowledge which is based thereon and }.- the sume as worship. It is surely not the knowled ;e arising out of (the syntax of) sentences, because such (knowledge) results logically from the sentence itself, even without an injunction (enjoining that knowledge), and because also the removal of ignorance does not result from just so much alone. Moreover, it should not be urged that, when the innate impression (vaiand) of distinctions remains unremoved, the Vedantic sentence does not give rise to that knowledge which is destructive of ignorance ; that even if it (viz. such knowledge) come into existence (thus), it is nothing wrong if, all at once, the perception of distinctions does not cease for all, as in the analogous case of the persistence of the perception of two moons even when the