[Footnote 151: Cf. _supra_, p. 113. Mádhava here condenses Abhinava Gupta's commentary. Abhinava Gupta lived in the beginning of the eleventh century (see Bühler's Tour in Cashmere, pp. 66, 80).] [Footnote 152: I have seen in Calcutta a short Comm. on the Śiva sútras by Utpala, the son of Udayákara (cf. pp. 130, 131).--E. B. C.] CHAPTER IX. THE RASEŚVARA-DARŚANA OR MERCURIAL SYSTEM.[153] Other Máheśvaras there are who, while they hold the identity of self with God, insist upon the tenet that the liberation in this life taught in all the systems depends upon the stability of the bodily frame, and therefore celebrate the virtues of mercury or quicksilver as a means of strengthening the system. Mercury is called _párada_, because it is a means of conveyance beyond the series of transmigratory states. Thus it has been said-- "It gives the farther shore of metempsychosis: it is called _párada_." And again in the Rasárṇava-- "It is styled _párada_ because it is employed for the highest end by the best votaries. "Since this in sleep identical with me, goddess, arises from my members, and is the exudation of my body, it is called _rasa_." It may be urged that the literal interpretation of these words is incorrect, the liberation in this life being explicable in another manner. This objection is not allowable, liberation being set out in the six systems as subsequent to the death of the body, and upon this there can be no reliance, and consequently no activity to attain to it free from misgivings. This is also laid down in the same treatise-- "Liberation is declared in the six systems to follow the death of the body. "Such liberation is not cognised in perception like an emblic myrobalan fruit in the hand. "Therefore a man should preserve that body by means of mercury and of medicaments." Govinda-bhagavat also says-- "Holding that the enjoyments of wealth and of the body are not permanent, one should strive "After emancipation; but emancipation results from knowledge, knowledge from study, and study is only possible in a healthy body." The body, some one may say, is seen to be perishable, how can its permanency be effected? Think not so, it is replied, for though the body, as a complexus of six sheaths or wrappers of the soul, is dissoluble, yet the body, as created by Hara and Gaurí under the names of mercury and mica, may be perdurable. Thus it is said in the Rasahṛidaya-- "They who, without quitting the body, have attained to a new body, the creation of Hara and Gaurí, "They are to be lauded, perfected by mercury, at whose service is the aggregate of magic texts."