The former is again divided into "antecedent," "emergent," and "absolute." "Antecedent" is that non-existence which, though without any beginning, is not everlasting; "emergent" is that which, though having a beginning, is everlasting; "absolute" is that non-existence which abides in its own counter-entity;[203] "reciprocal non-existence" is that which, being different from "absolute," has yet no defined limit [i.e., no terminus ad quem nor terminus a quo, as "antecedent" and "emergent" have].
If you raise the objection that "'reciprocal non-existence' is really the same as 'absolute non-existence,'" we reply that this is indeed to lose one's way in the king's highroad; for "reciprocal non-existence" is that negation whose opposite is held to be identity, as "a jar is not cloth;" but "absolute non-existence" is that negation whose opposite is connection, as "there is no colour in the air."[204] Nor need you here raise the objection that "abháva can never be a means of producing any good to man," for we maintain that it is his summum bonum, in the form of final beatitude, which is only another term for the absolute abolition of all pain [and therefore comes under the category of abháva].
E. B. C.
FOOTNOTES:
[154] The Vaiśeshikas are called Aulúkyáḥ in Hemachandra's Abhidhána-chintámaṇi; in the Váyu-puráṇa (quoted in Aufrecht's Catal. p. 53 b, l. 23), Akshapáda, Kaṇáda, Ulúka, and Vatsa are called the sons of Śiva.
[155] He is here called by his synonym Kaṇabhaksha.
[156] It is singular that this is inaccurate. The ninth book treats of that perception which arises from supersensible contact, &c., and inference. The tenth treats of the mutual difference of the qualities of the soul, and the three causes.
[157] For this extract from the old bháshya of Vátsyáyana, see Colebrooke's Essays (new edition), vol. i. p. 285.
[158] Cf. Bháshá-parichchheda, śloka 14.
[159] "Particularity" (viśesha) resides by "intimate relation" in the eternal atoms, &c.