It is a very peculiar situation in which the mind is placed. We are pulled from the
earth side as well as from side of the heavens, from the objective side and from the
subjective side, from the material side and from the spiritual side, from the external
side and from the internal side, and so on—in umpteen different manifold ways.
This mind is constituted of many vasanas, or impressions of past experience, as we
studied in one of the earlier sutras. The mind is not a compact, single, indivisible
substance. It is a picturesque complex in whose bosom we can find infinite varieties
of impressions which have been accumulated there on account of the experiences it
has passed through in the various lives, or incarnations, since aeons. Tat asaṅkhyeya
vāsanābhiḥ citram api parāthaṁ saṁhatyakāritvāt (IV.24): It is picturesque and
variegated on account of containing an infinite number of impressions of past
experience, which become the causative factors of future experience of a similar kind.
Yet, with all this infinite content of vasanas, or impressions, within itself, the mind is
not absolutely independent. Parartham: It is dependent. It is dependent because its
very function is directed by the energy of something which is different from itself.
The energy for the function of the mind comes from the purusha, the Supreme
Transcendent Being.
Samhatyakaritvat: The mind is an assemblage of vasanas. An assemblage, or a
group of varieties of contents, cannot be regarded as a permanent, solid entity
because anything that is made up of parts is subject to disintegration and
dismemberment. The inner constituents of the mind are subject to modification of
pattern, and this change in the pattern of the variety of contents inside the mind is
the cause of the change of personality, or individuality—or in other words, we may
say the cause of what we call rebirth. A complete reconstitution of the inner contents
of the mind requires a corresponding vehicle, materially, for the purpose of
expressing the urges of this reconstituted mind; and this new vehicle that is
manufactured, or brought into being, by the requirements of this newly constituted
pattern—that is the new birth of the body.
Thus, the mind that is made up of many vasanas, or impressions, that is variegated
in its nature and multifarious in the various levels of its constitution is not
independent by itself. Its functions are for another purpose altogether—the purpose
being transcendent to its own existence. What is the purpose? The purpose of the
mind is the purpose of the universe itself. What is the purpose of the universe? Why
is there evolution? Why is there change? Why is there activity? Why is there effort?
The answer to these questions is also the answer to the other question: why is the
mind functioning at all in the direction of objects with the energy that it receives
from the purusha?
The purpose of the functions of the mind is the evolution of the individual for the
attainment of perfection, which is called kaivalya or moksha. It does not act
unnecessarily. It is not an aimless activity in which the mind is engaged. Even the so-
called erroneous meanderings of the mind in the desert of samsara are with a
purpose. The purpose is the search for that which it has lost—namely, the noumenon,
the supreme purusha, the Absolute.
Every activity of every individual in any manner whatsoever, under any condition, is
a movement towards the Absolute, whether it is consciously directed or otherwise.
When the meaning of these movements is not consciously clear and we are