ATMANANDA--SUBJECT IS OBJECT

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When the unknown is sensed, something objective comes in. When you

try to objectify

the Reality, you first superimpose form upon it; and upon this most

general form,

innumerable other details are superimposed, by one or more of the

sense organs. This

is how an object is visualized.

The form never exists independently of the sense organ, and so it can

never exist

outside the sense organ which perceives it. What we know in a

perception is only our

own superimposition, including our own samskaras; and it is not the

Reality at all,

which of course is not perceivable. The thing in itself – the

Reality – transcends both

the known and the unknown.

All objects, thoughts and feelings are known through the senses or

the mind. But I

always know that `I am'. This knowledge is not obtained through any

sensory organ

or agent, and so it is called direct knowledge.

Looking more closely, we find that even in sensory perception, it is

only direct

knowledge that is experienced. When I say I know an object, the

object is reduced in

terms of knowledge to knowledge itself, and can no longer be called

an object. As

knowledge, it can have no limitation either, there being nothing

other than knowledge

existing beside it.

So, what actually happens, even in sensory perceptions, is that the

self (Consciousness)

knows the self (Consciousness). Every sensory perception is in fact

direct

knowledge. Thus, when you come to knowledge, no object can exist as

such. The

object is only an object of the sense organs, and never the object of

knowing. Knowledge

can know only knowledge.

When a disciple retreats consciously from his body, senses and mind

to his innermost

self – pure Consciousness – knowledge dawns; and he is said to have

realized.

When knowledge dawns, objects and senses vanish. The same process

also repeats

itself during every sensory perception; and you always know nothing

but the Reality.