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Nor is it true that the doctrine of identity would imply that nobody is entitled to works, &c., and is contrary to perception and so on. For we admit that before true knowledge springs up, the soul is implicated in the transmigratory state, and that this state constitutes the sphere of the operation of perception and so on. On the other hand texts such as ‘But when the Self only has become all this, how should he see another?’ &c., teach that as soon as true knowledge springs up, perception, &c., are no longer valid.

Nor do we mind your objecting that if perception, &c., cease to be valid, scripture itself ceases to be so; for this conclusion is just what we assume. For on the ground of the text, ‘Then a father is not a father’ up to ‘Then the Vedas are not Vedas’ (Br̥. Up. IV, 3, 22), we ourselves assume that when knowledge springs up scripture ceases to be valid.

And should you ask who then is characterised by the absence of true knowledge, we reply: You yourself who ask this question!

And if you retort, ‘But I am the Lord as declared by scripture,’ we reply, ‘Very well, if you have arrived at that knowledge, then there is nobody who does not possess such knowledge.’

This also disposes of the objection, urged by some, that a system of non-duality cannot be established because the Self is affected with duality by Nescience.

Hence we must fix our minds on the Lord as being the Self.