desires, or desires the Self only, the vital spirits of him (tasya) do
not depart--being Brahman he goes to Brahman.'

We have seen above (p. lxxx) that this passage is referred to in the
important Sûtras on whose right interpretation it, in the first place,
depends whether or not we must admit the Sûtrakâra to have acknowledged
the distinction of a parâ and an aparâ vidyâ. Here the passage interests
us as throwing light on the way in which /S/a@nkara systematises. He
looks on the preceding part of the chapter as describing what happens to
the souls of all those who do not know the highest Brahman, inclusive of
those who know the lower Brahman only. They pass out of the old bodies
followed by all prâ/n/as and enter new bodies. He, on the other hand,
section 6 continues, who knows the true Brahman, does not pass out of
the body, but becomes one with Brahman then and there. This
interpretation of the purport of the entire chapter is not impossibly
right, although I am rather inclined to think that the chapter aims at
setting forth in its earlier part the future of him who does not know
Brahman at all, while the latter part of section 6 passes on to him who
does know Brahman (i.e. Brahman pure and simple, the text knowing of no
distinction of the so-called lower and higher Brahman). In explaining
section 6 /S/a@nkara lays stress upon the clause 'na tasya prâ/n/a
utkrâmanti,' 'his vital spirits do not pass out,' taking this to signify
that the soul with the vital spirits does not move at all, and thus does
not ascend to the world of Brahman; while the purport of the clause may
simply be that the soul and vital spirits do not go anywhere else, i.e.
do not enter a new body, but are united, somehow or other, with Brahman.
On /S/a@nkara's interpretation there immediately arises a new
difficulty. In the /s/lokas, quoted under sections 8 and 9, the
description of the small old path which leads to the svargaloka and
higher on clearly refers--as noticed already above--to the path through