64. These forms appeared to view as by an act of chance, and the organs whereby they came to be seen, were afterwards called by name of eyes, or the visual organs of sight.
65. The organs which gave the perception of sounds, were named the ears; and those which bore the feeling of touch to the mind, were called the organs of feeling or त्वक्.
66. The organ of perceiving the flavours, was styled the tongue or organ of taste; and that which received the perception of smell, were termed the nose or organ of scent.
67. The living soul being subjected to its corporeal body, has no perception of the distinctions of time and place by means of its bodily organs, which are so imperfect and soulless on the whole. (i.e. He is not thoroughly diffused all over the body, but has its seat in the mind also, which perceives the abstract ideas of time and space and all other abstract natures of things).
68. In this manner are all things but imageries of the soul, and ideals of the intellect, and wholly confined in the soul; they neither appear nor set on the out side of it, but are set as silent engravings in the stony and stiff bosom of the same.
CHAPTER CLXXXVIII.
Description of the living soul.
Argument:—The Living soul is identified with Brahma or the universal soul; its birth is but a fiction of speech; and the erroneous conception of its animal soul and body, is fully exposed herein.
Vasishtha continued:—The fiction of the first rise of the living soul; from the calm and quiet spirit of God as said before, is merely fictitious and not a true one; but was meant to elucidate the nature of the animate soul, as the same with and not distinct from the Supreme soul.
2. In this manner the fiction (of the living soul) means that, this being a part of the supreme soul is verily the same with it. (As the air in the pot or cot, is the same as universal air or vacuum). It is when the subjective soul is employed with the thoughts of the objective, that it is termed the living God or spirit. (Hence the quiescent and creative souls, are but the states or hypostases of the same soul).
3. The inclination of the self-intelligent or subjective soul, towards thinkable objects of thought, garbs it under a great many fictitious names or epithets, which you shall now hear me, O Ráma, relate to you in all their varieties.