of him who dies in the possession of the lower knowledge, while two
sections (IV, 2, 12-14; IV, 4, 1-7) tell us what happens to him who,
before his death, had risen to the knowledge of the highest Brahman.
According to Râmânuja, on the other hand, the three pâdas, referring
throughout to one subject only, give an uninterrupted account of the
successive steps by which the soul of him who knows the Lord through the
Upanishads passes, at the time of death, out of the gross body which it
had tenanted, ascends to the world of Brahman, and lives there for ever
without returning into the sa/m/sâra.

On an a priori view of the matter it certainly appears somewhat strange
that the concluding section of the Sûtras should be almost entirely
taken up with describing the fate of him who has after all acquired an
altogether inferior knowledge only, and has remained shut out from the
true sanctuary of Vedântic knowledge, while the fate of the fully
initiated is disposed of in a few occasional Sûtras. It is, I think, not
too much to say that no unbiassed student of the Sûtras would--before
having allowed himself to be influenced by /S/a@nkara's
interpretations--imagine for a moment that the solemn words, 'From
thence is no return, from thence is no return,' with which the Sûtras
conclude, are meant to describe, not the lasting condition of him who
has reached final release, the highest aim of man, but merely a stage on
the way of that soul which is engaged in the slow progress of gradual
release, a stage which is indeed greatly superior to any earthly form of
existence, but yet itself belongs to the essentially fictitious
sa/m/sâra, and as such remains infinitely below the bliss of true mukti.
And this à priori impression--which, although no doubt significant,
could hardly be appealed to as decisive--is confirmed by a detailed
consideration of the two sets of Sûtras which /S/a@nkara connects with
the knowledge of the higher Brahman. How these Sûtras are interpreted by