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LECTURE IV.

The Nyaya.

E begin with the Nyaya of Gotama or Gautama, with its supplement, the Vaiśeshika, not because this is first in order of time (see p. 48), but because it is generally the first studied, and much of its terminology is adopted by the other systems1.

The word Nyaya signifies 'going into a subject,' that is, investigating it analytically. In this sense of analysis,' Nyaya is exactly opposed to the word Sankhya, 'synthesis.' It is common to suppose that the Nyaya is chiefly concerned with logic; but this is merely one part of a single topic. The fact rather is that this system was intended to furnish a correct method of philosophical inquiry into all the objects and subjects of human knowledge, including, amongst others, the process of reasoning and laws of thought. The Nyaya proper differs from its later development, the Vaiśeshika, by propounding sixteen topics in its first Sūtra. The first topic of these sixteen is Pra

1 The Nyaya Sūtras, consisting of five books, with the commentary, were printed at Calcutta in 1828, under the title of Nyaya-sutra-vritti. Four of the five books were edited and translated by the late Dr. Ballantyne. He also published the Nyaya compendium, called Tarka-sangraha. A favourite text-book of this system is the Bhasha-pariććheda, with its commentary, called Siddhanta-muktāvalī. This has been edited and translated by Dr. Röer. The Vaiseshika Sutras, consisting of ten books, have quite recently been edited and translated in a scholarlike manner by Mr. A. E. Gough, one of my most distinguished Boden scholars, and now Anglo-Sanskrit Professor in the Government College, Benares. Professor E. B. Cowell's edition of the Kusumānjali, a Nyaya treatise proving the existence of a God, is an interesting work.

māṇa, that is, the means or instruments by which Pramā or the right measure of any subject is to be obtained. Under this head are enunciated the different processes by which the mind arrives at true and accurate knowledge.

These processes are declared in the third Sūtra of the first book to be four, viz.

a. Pratyaksha, 'perception by the senses.' b. Anumāna, ‘inference.' c. Upamāna, 'comparison.' d. Śabda, 'verbal authority' or 'trustworthy testimony,' including Vedic revelation.

The treatment of the second of these, viz. inference, possesses more interest for Europeans, as indicating that the Hindus have not, like other nations, borrowed their logic and metaphysics from the Greeks.

Inference is divided in Sūtra I. 32 into five Avayavas or 'members.'

1. The pratijñā or proposition (stated hypothetically).

2. The hetu or reason.

3. The udāharana (sometimes called nidarśana) or example (equivalent to the major premiss).

4. The upanaya or application of the reason (equivalent to the minor premiss).

5. The nigamana or conclusion (i.e. the pratijna or 'proposition' re-stated as proved).

This method of splitting an inference or argument into five divisions is familiarly illustrated by native commentators thus:

1. The hill is fiery; 2. for it smokes; 3. whatever smokes is fiery, as a kitchen-hearth (or, inversely, not as a lake, which is invariably without fire); 4. this hill smokes; 5. therefore this hill is fiery.

Here we have a combination of enthymeme and syllogism, which seems clumsy by the side of Aristotle's more concise method; the fourth and fifth members being repetitions of the second and first, which, therefore, appear superfluous. But it possesses some advantages when

regarded, not as a syllogism, but as a full and complete rhetorical statement of an argument.

Perhaps the most noticeable peculiarity in the Indian method, stamping it as an original and independent analysis of the laws of thought, is the use of the curious terms, Vyapti, 'invariable pervasion' or 'concomitance ;' Vyāpaka, 'pervader' or 'invariably pervading attribute;' and Vyāpya, 'invariably pervaded.' These terms are employed in making a universal affirmation or in affirming universal distribution; as, for example, 'Wherever there is smoke there is fire.' 'Wherever there is humanity there is mortality.' In such cases an Indian logician always expresses himself by saying that there is an invariably pervading concomitance of fire with smoke and of mortality with humanity.

Similarly, fire and mortality are called the pervaders (Vyāpaka), smoke and humanity the pervaded (Vyāpya). The first argument would therefore be thus briefly stated by a Naiyāyika. The mountain has invariably fire-pervaded smoke, therefore it has fire.

To show the importance attached to a right understanding of this technical expression Vyapti, and to serve as a specimen of a Naiyāyika writer's style, I now make an abridged extract from Sankara-miśra's comment on the fourteenth Sūtra of the first daily lesson of the third book of the Vaiseshika Sūtras (Gough, p. 86):

It may be asked, What is this invariable concomitance? (Nanu keyam vyāptiḥ.) It is not merely a relation of co-extension. Nor is it the relation of totality. For if you say that invariable concomitance is the connection of the middle term with the whole of the major term (kṛitsnasya sādhyasya sādhana-sambandhaḥ), such connection does not exist in the case of smoke, &c. [for although fire exists wherever smoke exists, smoke does not always exist where fire exists, not being found in red-hot iron]. Nor is it natural conjunction; for the nature of a thing is the thing's proper mode of being. Nor is it invariable co-inherence of the major, which is absent only when there is absolute non-existence of that of which the middle is

predicated; for volcanic fire must always be non-existent in a kitchenhearth, though smoky. Nor is it the not being a subject of incompatibility with the predicate. Nor is it the possession of a form determined by the same connection as something else; as, for instance, the being fiery is not determined by connection with smoke, for the being fiery is more extensive. We proceed, then, to state that invariable concomitance is a connection requiring no qualifying term or limitation (an-aupādhikaḥ sambandhaḥ)1. It is an extensiveness co-extensive with the predicate (sādhya-vyāpaka-vyāpakatvam). In other words, invariable concomitance is invariable co-inherence of the predicate".

The second head or topic of the Nyaya is Prameya, by which is meant all the objects or subjects of Pramā— those points, in short, about which correct knowledge is to be obtained. This topic includes all the most important subjects investigated by Indian philosophy. The Prameyas are twelve, as given in the ninth Sutra; thus,

1. Soul (ātman). 2. Body (sarira). 3. Senses (indriya). 4. Objects of sense (artha). 5. Understanding or intellection (buddhi). 6. Mind (manas). 7. Activity (pravṛitti). 8. Faults (dosha). 9. Transmigration (pretya-bhāva). 10. Consequences or fruits (phala). 11. Pain (duḥkha). 12. Emancipation (apavarga).

In his first topic Gautama provides for hearing opposing disputants who desire to discuss fairly any of these Prameyas which form his second topic.

With regard to his fourteen other topics, they seem to be not so much philosophical categories as an enumeration of the regular stages through which a controversy is likely

1 Hence, 'the mountain is smoky because it has fire' is not vyāpti, but ati-vyapti, because the upadhi or qualification ärdrendana-jāta, 'produced by wet wood,' must be added to make the argument correct. When the middle term (fire) and the major (smoke) are made co-extensive then the fault of ati-vyāpti is removed.

2 It would be difficult to convey to a general reader any idea of the terseness with which the use of long compounds enables all this to be expressed in the original Sanskrit. Of course the obscurity of the style is proportionably great, and the difficulty of translation enhanced. Mr. Gough, however, is not responsible for every word of the above.

to pass. In India argument slides into wrangling disputation even more easily than in Europe, and these remaining topics certainly illustrate very curiously the captious propensities of a Hindu disputant, leading him to be quick in repartee and ready with specious objections in opposition to the most conclusive logic.

There is, first, the state of Samsaya, or 'doubt about the point to be discussed.' Next, there must be a Prayojana, 'motive for discussing it.' Next, a Drishṭānta, or 'familiar example,' must be adduced in order that a Siddhānta, or 'established conclusion,' may be arrived at. Then comes an objector with his Avayava, or 'argument' split up, as we have seen, into five members. Next follows the Tarka, or 'refutation (reductio ad absurdum) of his objection,' and the Nirnaya, or ascertainment of the true state of the case.' But this is not enough to satisfy a Hindu's passion for disputation. Every side of a question must be examined-every possible objection stated-and so a further Vāda, or 'controversy,' takes place, which of course leads to Jalpa, 'mere wrangling,' followed by Vitanda, 'cavilling;' "Hetv-ābhāsa, fallacious reasoning1;' Chala, 'quibbling artifices;' Jati, 'futile replies;' and Nigraha-sthāna, 'the putting an end to all discussion' by a demonstration of the objector's incapacity for argument.

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The above are Gotama's sixteen topics. After enumerating them he proceeds to state how deliverance from the misery of repeated births is to be attained; thus,—

Misery, birth, activity, fault, false notions; on the removal of these in turn (beginning with the last), there is the removal also of that which precedes it; then ensues final emancipation.

1 As an example of fallacious argument may be taken the sixteenth Aphorism of the third book of the Vaiseshika Sūtras, yasmād vishāṇī tasmād aśvaḥ, ‘because this has horns, therefore it is a horse;' or the next Sutra, yasmād vishānī tasmad gauḥ, because it has horns, therefore it is a cow,' which last is the fallacy of undistributed middle.'

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