18. I am partly of a material frame, on my body and mind, but spiritually I am an empty immaterial substance; and though felt by the touch of the hand, I am yet as intangible as a nocturnal fiend:—(an empty shadow only). 19. Ráma said:—It is said Sir, that at the end of a great Kalpa age, the visible world remains in its seed; after which it developes again in its present form, which I require to be fully explained to me. 20. Are they ignorant or knowing men, who think in these various ways? Please Sir, tell me the truth for removal of my doubts, and relate to me the process of the development. 21. Vasishtha replied:—Those who say that the mundane world existed in the form of a seed at the final sleep (of Brahmá), are altogether ignorant of the truth, and talk as children and boys: (from what they think themselves, or hear from others). 22. Hear me tell you, how unaccordant it is to right reason and how far removed from truth. It is a false supposition, and leading both the preacher and hearer of such a doctrine to great error and egregious mistake. 23. Those who attempt to show the existence of the world, in the form of a germ in the mundane seed; maintain a very silly position, as I shall now explain unto you. 24. A seed is in itself a visible thing, and is more an object of sense than that of the mind; as the seeds of paddy and barley, are seen to sprout forth in their germs and leaves. 25. The mind which is beyond the six organs of sense, is a very minute particle; and it cannot possibly be born of itself, nor become the seed of the universe. 26. The Supreme Spirit also, being more rarefied than the subtile ether, and undefinable by words, cannot be of the form of a seed. 27. That which is as minute as a nil and a zero, is equivalent to nothing; and could never be the mundane seed, without which there could be no germ nor sprout. 28. That which is more rare and transparent than the vacuous and clear firmament; cannot possibly contain the world with all its mountains and seas; and the heavens with all their hosts, in its transcendent substratum. 29. There is nothing, that is in any way situated as a substance, in the substantiality of that Being; or if there is anything there, why is it not visible to us? 30. There is nothing that comes of itself, and nothing material that comes but of the immaterial spirit; for who can believe a hill to proceed from the hollowness of an earthen pot? 31. How can a thing remain with another, which is opposed to it in its nature? How can there be any shadow where there is light, and how does darkness reside in the disc of the sun, or even coldness in fire? 32. How can an atom contain a hill, or anything subsist in nothing? The union of a similar with its dissimilar, is as impossible as that of shadow with the light of the sun.