the lower' (Mu. Up. II, 2, 8); 'He who knows the bliss of Brahman fears
nothing' (Taitt. Up. II, 9); 'O Janaka, you have indeed reached
fearlessness' (B/ri/. Up. IV, 2, 4); 'That Brahman knew its Self only,
saying, I am Brahman. From it all this sprang' (B/ri/. Up. I, 4, 10);
'What sorrow, what trouble can there be to him who beholds that unity?'
(Îs. Up. 7.) We must likewise quote the passage,--B/ri/. Up. I, 4, 10,
('Seeing this the /Ri/shi Vâmadeva understood: I was Manu, I was the
sun,') in order to exclude the idea of any action taking place between
one's seeing Brahman and becoming one with the universal Self; for that
passage is analogous to the following one, 'standing he sings,' from
which we understand that no action due to the same agent intervenes
between the standing and the singing. Other scriptural passages show
that the removal of the obstacles which lie in the way of release is the
only fruit of the knowledge of Brahman; so, for instance, 'You indeed
are our father, you who carry us from our ignorance to the other shore'
(Pr. Up. VI, 8); 'I have heard from men like you that he who knows the
Self overcomes grief. I am in grief. Do, Sir, help me over this grief of
mine' (Ch. Up. VII, 1, 3); 'To him after his faults had been rubbed out,
the venerable Sanatkumâra showed the other side of darkness' (Ch. Up.
VII, 26, 2). The same is the purport of the Sûtra, supported by
arguments, of (Gautama) Âkârya, 'Final release results from the
successive removal of wrong knowledge, faults, activity, birth, pain,
the removal of each later member of the series depending on the removal
of the preceding member' (Nyây. Sû. I, i, 2); and wrong knowledge itself
is removed by the knowledge of one's Self being one with the Self of
Brahman.

Nor is this knowledge of the Self being one with Brahman a mere
(fanciful) combination[73], as is made use of, for instance, in the
following passage, 'For the mind is endless, and the Vi/s/vedevas are