Essays on the Gita, First Series (Arya Publishing House, 1922)

developed power of life, desir e, e motio n, passion ^ pleasure, sutferm g,1 ^ile sattw a, emerg ing, but still depen3ent on the lower action, contributes to th^se the first light of the conscious mind, the mechanical sense of ego, conscious memory, a certain kind of thought, especially the wonders of instinct and animal .intuition. But as yet the buddhi, the intelligent will , h as not developed the full ligh t of consciousness ; therefore, no responsibility can be attributed t^ the animal for its actions. The tiger can be no more blamed for filing and devouring than the atom for its blind movements, the fire for burning and consuming or the storm for its destructions. If it could answer the question, the tiger would indeed say, like man, that it had free will, it would have the egoism of the doer, it would say, “I kill, I devour'' ; but we can see clearly enough that it is not really t he tige r> but N ature in the tiger that k^s, it is Nature in t ne tiger“ ^at devours ; inST if it refrains from killing or devouring, it is from satiety, from fear or from indolence, from another principle of Nature in it, f rom the action of the g pnaLcalled tamas > As it was Nature in the animal that killed, so it is Nature in the animal that refrained from killing. Whatever soul is in it, sanctions passively the action of Nature, is as much passive in its passion and activity as in its indolence or inaction. The anim al like the atom acts according to the mechanj jsmiQf its Nature, and not otherwise, sadri^ am cheshtat e

THE DETERMINISM OF NATURE swasydh prakfiteh, as if mounted on ji macWne, •^ ^trdrudho mdy ayd. ^

Well, but in man at least there is another action, a free soul, a free will, a sense of responsibi- lity, a real doer other than Nature, other than the mechanism of Maya? So i t seems, because i n man there is a conscious intelligent wi ll ; buddhi is full of the light of the observing Purusha, who through it, it seems, observes, understands, approves, or dis- approves, gives or withholds the sanction, seems indeed at last to begin to be the lord of his nature. Man is not like the t iger or the fire or the storm ; h e cannot kill and s ay as a sufficient justification, "1 am act ing acc ording to jimiamre*', and he can- not do it, because he has not the nature and not, therefore, the law of action, swadharma, of the tiger, storm or fire. He has a conscious intelligent will, ^J)uddhi, and to lhat he must refer his actions."" If he 3oes hot do s o. i f he acts blindly accordi ng to his impulse s and passion s, t hen the law of h is being is not rightly worked ou t, s wadharmah su-anus hthi- t ah, he has not acted a ccorflm^ to tTie full m easure o f his human ity, but even as might the animal. It is true that the principle of rajas or the principle of tamos gets hold of his buddhi and induces' it to justify any and every action he commits or any avoidance of action ; but still the justification or at least the reference to the buddhi must be there either before or after the action is committed. And, besides, i xL nian sattwa i^awake and a cts not only as intellig^ce and intellftm will, but as a seeking