"The eye now sees when opened; when closed,
The blind one it is that remains within, as awareness has not come.
Knowledge cannot come out by itself;
It needs the eye to come, as the eye light"

Narayana Guru, Advaita Dipika, V.19

Translated with full introduction and commentary by his direct disciple,
Nataraja Guru.
Copyright Dr.Nataraja Guru,1968.
Prepared from the original typescript.

With profound adoration to the Absolute with all the long line of its bygone teachers and the makers of its tradition, irrespective of time or clime, and with apologies for seeming to treat, by any chance, any of them as not perfectly equal in spiritual status under the aegis of the Absolute.

This work is hereby dedicated to Narayana Guru, the one sustaining source of its inspiration, by his disciple, the present writer.

WHEN I was still a teenager, more than 55 years ago, preparing to pass the high school examination which included some elementary science lessons, there was an elderly guest who was staying in my father's house, He looked like a simple Indian villager without even a shirt on, yet he also seemed to command great respect from my father who was an England-trained medical officer working under the Government of Mysore in Bangalore, South India.

This enigmatic person one day decided to ask me a pointed question. He prefaced the question with the following description of a mischievous spirit or imp known to the villagers of what was then Travancore State, (South India) as a kutti-cathan. (The word cathan may perhaps be derived from the word shasta which is one of the names for the Buddha, while kutti means small.) Such a spirit is not unknown in the West. He goes under the name of Puck in Shakespeare, and the well-known poltergeist is connected with him. I was then told by this old gentleman:

"Stones will fall from the roof; you can pick them up or put them under the coconut tree in your garden. They will remain there for any length of time. If you search for any stones of the kind missing in the surrounding area you will not find any. The falling stones can land near persons to frighten them."

After thus giving me a full account of the kutti-cathan, I was asked the following question:
"Have you any such thing in your science?"

This question from a simple man of an earlier generation left a strange and deep impression on me. The science I was taught at school limited itself to questions as to how a candle burned, etc. The decades that have followed have changed the simple character of science into what is now a vast body of knowledge, ever-encroaching into the domains of religion and philosophy. The answer which I could not give when I was a schoolboy, I feel I am more prepared to attempt now. It had never lost the poignancy and significant potency that it suggested to my mind at the time it was asked.

In the following pages I hope, however indirectly or partially it may be, to try and answer this question. I have also to say here that I have been guided throughout by this same man who first awoke my curiosity in this direction. This enigmatic man was none other than Narayana Guru, and it is to him again that I dedicate this attempted answer to his question. It is in the hope that it might serve similar disciples who are agitated by similar doubts and questions to my own that this book is written. These pages have been primarily intended for my own education and it is suggested that those who feel that the question asked me by Narayana Guru was superfluous, and that my answer in the following pages could also be so, need not take the trouble to continue its perusal.

As stated on the title page, the present work is based on the Darsana Mala (A Garland of Visions) by Narayana Guru, whose direct disciple the present writer happens to be. This Sanskrit text, consisting of 100 verses of 10 chapters with 10 verses in each, is meant to comprise the chief categories of all philosophical visions. Usually in India the Darsanas are treated as six in number, but works like the Sarva Darsana-Samgraha (Epitome of all Visions of Truth) sometimes discuss in detail 15 Indian darsanas. Each darsana is a recognizable philosophical system, or rather a unitive viewpoint referring to the Absolute.

Narayana Guru has not limited himself to the scope of Indian thought only, but thinks in terms of a series of all possible visions of any time and place. These visions are structurally strung together like precious stones forming a garland meant to be an ornament enhancing the dignity of humanity through wisdom. There is no mistaking that he draws his inspiration from the Upanishads and Bhagavad Gita, as is shown by his precise advaitic terminology. Another important source for his inspiration is what he derived from his own tapas (mystical. discipline). The Garland of Visions is the product of both inner experience and confirmation from outer textual sources. The primacy of this former radical source of wisdom makes his dependence upon texts only incidental.

In order to let the reader have the text in Sanskrit, there is a word-by-word transliteration which can be examined by anybody for purposes of verification or conviction. We have kept our own comments on the text strictly separate from the verses and Narayana Guru's intended commentary, as explained at the beginning of the text.

As this book is primarily meant for the use of disciples and only secondarily for the general reading public, we have taken care in our concluding remarks to explain to those who might be inclined to question the genuineness of this philosophy which we have attributed to Narayana Guru, that we have not departed from his own finalized standpoints and teaching. Let this Garland of Visions enhance human dignity and decrease suffering through a better understanding of life in the light of the Absolute. This is what we hope will happen to the earnest wisdom-seeker who reads this book. It is meant for true and dedicated seekers only; not those who are merely curious in a light-hearted way. A whole-hearted approach is necessary when wholesale wisdom is in question.

Thanks are due to many who have kindly and willingly cooperated in completing and giving this book finalized form. I shall not attempt to mention all of them by name, because of the difficulty of doing so in view of the quality or quantity of the help rendered by them when treated together as they ought to be. Those who helped me in those items in which I could not help myself, and those who answered consciously or unconsciously to the pressure of actual need, deserve my most grateful thanks.

Some have helped me with reference books and paper cuttings; others have offered me hospitality in far-off lands, added to my travel facilities, or arranged interviews and contacts for me. Others again have given me virtually the use of their eyes when my own eyesight has been weakening, especially during the last years. Some have taken down dictation during the early hours of the morning, by day and by night, while travelling or staying in the different centres or camps between Gent and Bombay, Delhi or Varkala, within which points I have been constantly moving, as they helped to prepare with promptness the first typescript.

The penultimate preparation for the press has been done, as before, by John Spiers, to whom I have already been so much indebted, almost, as it were, by divine dispensation. Fred Hass has also been a similar friend in need, as also Sannyasini Ramarani I have always kept Nitya Chaitanya Yati in my mind as a disciple who would benefit much from these writings.

I must also mention the help that came from Jean Convent, Dr. Joseph Vercruysse, and good Celine Gevaert, whom I am conscious to have troubled too much in reading to me and rereading the difficult passages from Bergson's criticism of Einstein's theories. They deserve my special thanks

I have exchanged notes on axiomatic thinking and schematization with Prof. Janin of the University of Lyon, besides receiving help from the several librarians of that university, as also those of Rome, Gent, Brussels, and London, all of whom took the trouble of seeking out valuable documents for me, and thus deserve my thanks. They were most serviceable to me in connection with the Unified Field Theory of Einstein, on which the finalized papers are still to be traced.

Besides all those who consciously gave their help, I can think of many whose hand has been more mysteriously evident now and then, lending themselves almost as if by accident to be helpers of much significance, enabling me at critical moments during the composition of the work, often to open up new avenues of fruitful research before me. Books have sometimes come to my hands very strangely and inexplicably. Some sort of good genie, whether called an elemental or a favourable spirit must be suspected even by a scientist, as being behind some, at least, of many such apparent coincidences.

By thanking the Absolute I can inclusively thank all my helpers, whether mundane or spiritual. I therefore incline before the Absolute in everlasting adoration, in the belief that in doing so I am in effect only adding glory to ourselves whose totality is no other than myself.

December, 1967

3 A.1 The Notion of the Absolute
4 A.2 Unified Science knows no Frontiers
5 A.3 The Structural Unity of Thought
7 A.4 Laboratory knowledge versus Seminary Wisdom
13 A.5 Concepts and Percepts at Loggerheads
15 A.6 The Axiomatic Origin of Possible Truth
19 A.7 The "Subject-Matter" and "Object-Matter" of this Work
23 A.8 The Status, Content, and Scope of the Absolute
25 A.9 The Term "Absolute" Widely used by Scientists
29 A.10 Dialectical Implications of the Content of the Absolute
33 A.11 The Dialectical Approach to the Notion of the Absolute
39 A.12 Dialectical Methodology
50 A.13 Certitude Resides at the Core of Consciousness
53 A.14 Further Light on the Scope and Limitations of this Science
53 A.15 Contributions of Vedanta Epistemology
56 A.16 The Scientific Certitude Claimed for the Work
63 A.17 Normalization and Neutralization of Scientific Thinking
68 A.18 The Gap Between Experimental and A priori Thinking
73 A.19 Experience and Experiment have to Interpenetrate to Reveal the Absolute
81 A.20 "Would not this two-fold effort make us relive the Absolute?"
88 A.21 Possibilities and Probabilities Meet in the Matrix of Relation-Relata
97 A.22 The Dialectical and Structural Relationship between Man and Machine
106 A.23 Semantic Polyvalence of the Word and its Meaning
115 A.24 Steps from Logic to Dialectic
122 A.25 Mathematics Reveals the Possibility of a Science of the Absolute
122 A.25 i The Mathematical Frame of Reference
129 A.26. ii The Delights and Puzzles of Mathematics
137 A.25. iii Mathematics Falls Short of the Absolute
143 A.26 The Possibility of Structural Analysis Inside the Total World of Discourse
147 A.27 Bergson's Own Structural Prognostics
156 A.28 A structural Model with Absolute Status Already in Use
165 A.29 Great Possibilities of Inter-disciplinary Structuralism
175 A.30 The Plan of this work

198 I.1.0 PROLOGUE
204 I 1.1 Inner and Outer Compatibilities
209 I.1.2 The Common Parameter Passing through Cosmology and Cosmogony
217 I.1.3 The Merits of Mathematical Language
220 I.1.4 The Prologue and Epilogue of Each Chapter Distinguished

225 I.2 DARSANA MALA: CHAPTER I : Adhyaropa Darsanam
(Vision by Supposition)

238 I.3.0 EPILOGUE:
244 I.3.1 Speculation versus Observation
246 I.3.2 Some Interesting Modern Views in Cosmology
249 I.3.3 Cosmogony in the Rig Veda
250 I.3.4 Cosmogony in. the Bible
250 I.3.5 The Interchangeability and Homogeneity of Dialectical Counterparts
255 I.3.6 Evolutionary Cosmological Processes
258 I.3.7 Evolution in Terms of Consciousness
268 I.3.8 The Place of Evolution in a Normalized Context
274 I.4 Concluding Remarks

281 II. 1.0 PROLOGUE:
282 II.1.1 Methodology and Structuralism
284 II.1.2 Further Implications of Cartesianism
288 II 1.3 Directing Human Understanding
290 II.1.4 The Status of the Horizontal Reference
291 II.1.5 A New Way in Physics
296 II.1.6 Relative and Absolute Time
300 II.1.7 Bergson's Five Objections to Relativity
302 II.1.8 Bergson's Objection Examined
305 II.1.9 Bergson's First Objection
312 II.1.10 Bergson's Second Objection
316 II.1.11 Bergson's Third Objection
321 II.1.12 Bergson's Fourth Objection
323 II.1.13 The Plurality of Times
335 II.1.14 Bergson's Fifth Objection
337 II.1.15 The 9 Figures of Light
343 II.1.16 The Space-Time of Four Dimensions
358 II.1.17 The Time of the Restricted Theory of Relativity
and the Space of the General Theory of Relativity
362 II.1.18 Axiomatic Physics

369 II .2 DARSANA MALA: CHAPTER II: Apavada Darsanam
(Vision of Non-Supposition):

376 II.3.0 EPILOGUE
379 II.3.1 New Methodological Perspectives
381 II.3.2 Demi-Relativity, Completer Correlates, Fuller Reciprocity,
Time-Space Continuum, and their Unity
383 II.3.3 The Epistemological and Methodological Context of this Chapter 386 II.3.4 A New Mathematical Language
390 II.3.5 Structure More Completely Conceived
393 II.3.6 Ascending and Descending Movement in Reasoning
395 II.3.7 The Transition from the Relative to the Absolute
398 II.3.8 The Analytic Approach
402 II.4 Concluding Remarks

409 III.1.0 PROLOGUE
413 III.1.1 Conversant about the mind
416 III.1.2 The Sets of Antitheses Involved
417 III.I.3 The Noema and Noetic in Phenomenology
421 III.1.4 The Idea of Process and Phenomenological Dynamism
426 III.I.5 Varieties and Interrelations
432 III.1.6 The Structure of Truth and Falsehood
438 III.I.7 Phenomenological Ontology
448 III.1.8 The Religious Aspect

III.2 DARSANA MALA: CHAPTER III : Asatya Darsanam
(Vision of Non-Existence)

464 III 3.0 EPILOGUE
466 III.3.1 The Epistemological Status of this Chapter
470 III.3.2 The Colour Solid and the Universal Concrete
474 III.3.3 Absolutist Reduction
478 III.3.4 Some Terms of Structural Importance
483 III.3.5 Two Grades of Eidetic Reciprocity
484 III.3.6 Phenomenological Echoes in the Upanishads ..
487 III.3.6. i The Unborn Female
492 III.3.6. ii The Thunderbolt Principle
493 III3.6 iii Phenomenological Monads
495 III.3.6. iv The Enigma of the Inverted Cup
497 III.4 Concluding Remarks

502 IV.0 PROLOGUE
507 IV.1.1 The Negativity of Kant and German Idealism
511 IV.1.2 Schelling's More Normative Position
513 IV.1.3 A Description of Maya
515 IV.4 Wrong Perspective about Maya
521 IV.1.5 Paradox and the Absolute
526 IV I.6 Scientific Philosophy
532 IV.1.7 The Opposition to Maya
537 IV.1.8 The Contrary and the Contradictory
543 IV.1.9 The Gap Between Ontology and Teleology

548 IV.2 DARSANA MALA: CHAPTER IV: Maya Darsanam
(Vision of Negation)

556 IV.3.0 EPILOGUE
560 IV.3.1 A Schematic Definition of Maya
564 IV.3.2 The Dynamism of Maya
567 IV.3.3 The Subtle Limbs of the Transcendental Maya Factor
568 IV.3.4 The Concrete Universal Within Maya
570 IV.3.5 The Basis of Ambiguity and Paradox
573 IV.3.6 pradhana and prakriti
576 IV.3.7 Orthodoxy and the Revaluation
of the Samkhya Philosophy in the Bhagavad Gita
583 IV.3.8 Upanishadic Reference to pradhana and other Samkhyan Terms
585 IV.3.9 From Non-Existence to the Atom
590 IV.3.10 The Dynamism of Mind-Matter Interaction
593 IV.3.11 The Machine Analogy
596 IV.4.12 Concluding Remarks

601 V.1.0 PROLOGUE
604 V.1.1 Mathematical and Mystical Language
607 V.1.2 Epistemological Revision of Science
608 V.1.3 The Structure of Intuitionist Mathematics
616 V.1.4 The Perceptual add Mathematical Realities of Relativity
618 V.1.5 Elimination of Unnecessary Structural Aspects
621 V.1.6 Bergson's Revaluation of Einstein
622 V.1.7 The Fourfold Aspects of Bergson's Revaluation
624 V.1.8 Structuralism in the Mandukya Upanishad
627 V.1.9 Double Correction and Scientific Certitude
629 V.1.10 Mathematical and Scientific Structuralism
634 V.1.11 The Total Speculative Ground Revealed by Structuralism
641 V.12 Structuralism Implied in Sankara
643 V.1.12 i a) The Jugglers
644 V.1.12. ii b) The Umbrella-Men
644 V.1.12 iii c) The Mendicants and the Brahmanas
645 V.1.12 iv d) The Falcon
645 V.1.12 v e) Parrots and Cages

648 V.2 DARSANAMALA: CHAPTER V : Bhana Darsanam
(Vision of Consciousness)

657 V.3.0 EPILOGUE
666 V.3.1 Imponderable Substantiality
667 V.3.2 The Refined World of Electromagnetism
670 V.3.3 The Visual and Auditory Function of Pure Matter
674 V.3.4 A Unit Notion of Thinking Substance
678 V.3.5 The High Dignity of the Fourth State
681 V.3.6 The Logical Frame of Reference
685 V.3.7 Complex Numbers and Physics
687 V.3.8 The Non-Dual Self
689 V.4 Concluding Remarks

694 B.0 INTRODUCTION TO PART TWO
696 B.1 The Three Steps in a Complete Philosophy
701 B.2 The Twofold Universe of Values
708 B.3 Dialectical Revaluation
711 B.4 Contemplative Orientation
722 B.5 Arivu (Knowledge, the Epistemology of Gnosis) by Narayana Guru
726 B.6 Structural Implications of Prayer
733 B.7 Daivadasakam (a prayer for humanity)
735 B.8 Some Structural Impossibilities
738 B.9 A Finer Circulation of Values
749 B.10 Axiology in Greek Drama
755 B.11 The Self as an Organon
758 B.12 One Absolute Substance
768 B.13 Dissolving Paradox
773 B.14 The Structural Pattern Emerging to View
776 B.15 Two Ways of Approaching the Absolute
780 B.16 A Running Review of the Six Darsanas
782 B.16.1 i The Nyaya Philosophy of Gautama
789 B.16.1 ii Structural Features of the Nyaya Philosophy
791 B.16. iii. The Fourfold Correlates
793 B.16.2.0 The Vaiseshika Philosophy of Kanada
797 B.16.2.i The Two Sets of Categories
799 B.16.2.ii The Units of Ultimate Existence
800 B.16.2.iii The Soul and Salvation
802 B.16.3.0 The Samkhya Philosophy of Kapila
805 B.16.i The Dynamism of the Three Nature Modalities
806 B.16.ii Kapila, the First Known Samkhya Philosopher
808 B.16.iii Schematic Implications
808 B.16.iv The Yoga of Patanjali
815 B.16.5.0 The Mimamsas of Jaimini and Badarayana
819 B.16.5 i Semantics and Logical Form in the Mimamsa
821 B.16.5 ii Brute Vedism Dialectically Revalued
827 B.16.5 iii From the Roaring Bull to Pure Semiosis
833 B.16.6 iv The Structure of the Eternal Word-Sound
838 B.16.5 v The Complementarity of the Mimamsas
843 B.16.5 vi The Vedanta of Badarayana
848 B.16.5 vii Vedanta Confined to the Brahma Sutras
855 B.16.5. viii A Critical Appraisal of the Brahma Sutras
and Vedanta in General
861 B.16.5 ix General or Greater Vedanta
865 B.17 Brahma Vidya Pancakam
867 B.18 Municarya Pancakam
869 B.19 Higher Criticism and Mysticism
877 B.20 Definition of Mysticism

884 VI.I.0 PROLOGUE
888 VI.I.1 The Workings of Instrumental Mysticism
892 VI.I.2 Integration of Mystical Expressions
896 VI.I.3 Parity Between Instrument and Action
901 VI.I.4 Normal and Abnormal Mysticism
903 VI.I.4 i Nature Mysticism
904 VI.I.4 ii The mysticism of action
905 VI.I.4 iii The mysticism of agony
906 VI.I.4. v Philosophic mysticism
909 VI.I.4 vi The mysticism of the Sufis

912 VI.2. DARSANA MALA: CHAPTER VI: Karma Darsanam
(Vision of Action)

921 VI.3.0 EPILOGUE
925 VI.3.1 The Certitude in this Chapter
928 VI.3.2 The Type of Action in this Chapter
929 VI.3.3 Functional Units of Activity
932 VI.3.4 Transcending Action
937 VI.3.5 Absolutist Mystical Expression
940 VI.3.6 Anukampa Dasakam
942 VI.3.7 Jiva Karunya Pancakam
943 VI.4 Concluding Remarks

950 VII.I.0 PROLOGUE
952 VII.I.1 Apodictic, Dialectic, and Intermediary Certitude
954 VII.I.2 The Correct Position of Pure Reason
957 VII.I.3 Kant's Critique of Pure Reason
965 VII.I.4 The non-Dialectical Logic of this Chapter
968 VII.I.5 Fourfold Absurdities of non-Normalized Reason
971 VII.I.6 The Claims of the Axiomatic and the Dialectical
974 VII.I.7 The Togetherness of Thought in Pure Reason

982 VII.2 DARSANA MALA: CHAPTER VII: Jnana Darsanam
(Vision by Reason)

991 VII3.0 EPILOGUE
993 VII.3.1 The Elements of Awareness
999 VII.3.2 From Uncertainty to Certitude
1003 VII.3.3 From the Psychological to t)ie Logical Self
1009 VII.3.4 The Importance of Verse Five
1010 VII.3.5 Certitude by General Awareness
1015 VII.3.6 The Teleological Pole of Logic
1020 VII.3.7 Concluding Remarks

1028 VIII.I.0 PROLOGUE
1031 VIII.I.1 Complementarity, Reciprocity, and Parity
1032 VIII.I.2 The Dynamics of Contemplative Life
1038 VIII.I.3 The Fundamentals of Ethics and Aesthetics Western Norms for a Good Life
1043 VIII.I.5 Democracy and Citizenship
1045 VIII.I.6 The City of God
1050 VIII.I.7 Self Contemplation as a Value
1058 VIII.I.8 Religious Expressions of Self Contemplation

1058 VIII.2 DARSANA MALA: CHAPTER VIII: Bhakti Darsanam
(Vision of Contemplation)

1066 VIII.3.0 EPILOGUE
1070 VIII.3.1 Bhakti in the Bhagavad Gita
1073 VIII.3.2 Absolutist Ethics and Aesthetics
1082 VIII.3.3 The Coherence of this Chapter
1085 VIII.3.4 The Components of Normal Contemplative Value
1089 VIII.3.5 Three Modern Indian Contemplative Mystics
1094 VIII.3.6 Concluding Remarks

1098 IX.1.0 PROLOGUE
1100 IX.1.1 The Interacting Counterparts
1104 IX.1.2 Three Components of Yoga
1109 IX.1.3 Sublimation of Instinctive Dispositions
1115 IX.1.4 The Mysterious Linking Power
1122 IX.1.5 A Unified Treatment of Yoga
1128 IX.1.6 The Inner Factor Involved in Meditation
1132 IX.J.7 Western Interest in yoga

1138 IX.2 DARSANA MALA CHAPTER IX: Yoga Darsanam
(Vision by Meditation)

1154 IX.3.0 EPILOGUE
1158 IX.3.1 Perfect Participation in Yoga
1162 IX.3.2 Some Original Features of the Yoga Upanishads
1167 IX.3.3 Structural Implications of the Categories of Patanjali
1173 IX.3.4 Concluding Remarks

1183 X.1.0 PROLOGUE
1185 X.1.1 The Scope of Nirvana
1189 X.1.2 A Definition of Nirvana
1193 X.1.3 Grades and Degrees of Perfection and Purity
1197 X.1.4 The Principle of Compensation
1202 X.1.5 The Equilibrium of a Twofold and Double Correction
1206 X.1.6 Vedanta and Western Thought
1210 X.1.7 Further Eschatological Implications

1213 X.2 DARSANA MALA: CHAPTER X: Nirvana Darsanam
(Vision by Absorption)

1229 X.3.0 EPILOGUE
1232 X.3.1 The Two Brahmans Involved in Every Stage of Nirvana
1238 X.3.2 Positive and Negative Limiting Types
1244 X.3.3 A Normalized Version of Nirvana
1248 X.3.4 The Nirvana That is One Degree Superior
1250 X.3.5 Other Precious Eschatological Indications
1252 X.3.6 The Seven Bhumikas of the Yoga Vasishtha
1254 X.3.7 Reincarnation
1256 X.3.8 Reincarnation of Evil Doers
1257 X.3.9 Hereditary Birth by Jati or Caste
1259 X.3.20 Transcending Birth and Rebirth

1267 X,4 Concluding Remarks
1274 C.O Main Conclusions
1277 C.1 A Retrospective Review
1282 C.2 A Word in Self-Defence
1284 C.3 Advaita Dipika with Commentary
1293 C.4 Some Additional Explanations