The subject that this treatise primarily establishes is expressed in brief within the opening verse. What is mentioned in the first quarter of the first verse is then expounded upon in the second verse:
Blue, yellow, gross and subtle, short and long and such distinctions— the eye perceives manifold forms in unity.
Syntactical arrangement: Due to distinctions of blue, yellow, gross, subtle, short, long and so forth, forms or objects of perception are manifold. The eye shall perceive these manifold forms in a single unified manner.
Translation: Forms or objects of perception exhibit infinite variety through distinctions of blue, yellow, gross, subtle, short, long and the like. The eye shall perceive all these varied forms as merely form or visibility itself—that is, as a single undifferentiated category.
Commentary: Multiplicity is the originating principle of visibility, and unity is the originating principle of the seer. For this reason, forms and objects of perception—red, blue, yellow and countless varieties—are considered visible objects arising from diverse sources by virtue of their manifold differentiation.
Because of the outer diversity of such variously colored forms and objects of perception, a corresponding multiplicity of distinctions arises among them. Without taking on these diverse essential characteristics, the eye or the faculty of sight shall perceive all those forms available to its perception in a single unified manner—'in oneness'—and only thus is the seer's nature of the eye established. (When the eye beholds a large object, it does not itself become equally large; when it perceives green grass, the eye does not turn green; that is, even as the shape, form and other qualities of the visible object change, the eye remains constant in its function as the seer.) From seeing onwards, through all functions of the five senses, whatever remains Constant or eternal or unchanging is the seer; whatever is Variable or temporal or changing is the seen. The ancient commentators prove this Constancy or eternal nature of the seer through direct perception alone. (Such knowledge is indeed self-evident understanding.) When I say that the self who once knew joy in the company of parents in childhood is the same self who now knows joy in the company of grandchildren in old age—there is but one reason: here Constancy itself constitutes the nature of perception, and the seer and perception (the joy of companionship) are one and the same thing. This would be impossible without eternal consciousness. This eternality or unity is inherent to the nature of the seer; the seen, conversely, must necessarily possess the opposite nature—it must be manifold and insentient. Otherwise it could not be the seen. Here parents and grandchild are the seen, and the joy of companionship is the seer. When a thing falsely appears to possess the eternality or unity characteristic of the seer, it ceases to be seen—that is, it no longer appears as an object of perception. Let me offer an example. Space and time, possessing an apparent eternality or unity in their nature, are not perceived as objects or are not graspable. But when these very two become divided into east-west-north-south and past-present-future, then visibility and graspability become attributed to them. When sudden changes in the seen create confusion within the seer's own being, such that multiplicity seems to arise within the unity of the seer—then the seer seeks out the inquiry into unity within its own essential nature to become established in truth. (As exemplified by the Vedantic method of 'neti neti'—not this, not this.)
(Overstatement—a statement where one's own words are claimed as another's. Implication—what is signified through a different statement. Instruction—words spoken for the purpose of teaching. Identification—the assertion "I myself am that person." Deceptive designation—the hidden expression of one's own ambition through pretense.)
Let us now examine how the Witness itself can be demonstrated to be the non-dual Self—that is to say, how the Self and Brahman are one.
Just as we affirm the truth or falsehood of a statement, so too do we sometimes deny it in particular contexts. The denial of the truth or falsehood of a statement is called negation, and the statement arising from it is called negating or contradictory.
Perceptions contradict one another. The rope mistaken for a snake, the false perception of an electric wire or water pipe, a stick, a garland—all such mutually contradictory perceptions must surely arise in some substratum. The nature of the Witness, like that rope itself, is present alongside all perceptions and remains unconditioned or unformed in particular instances; whether the rope is mistaken for a snake, a pipe, a stick, or a garland (in the form of appearances), the rope remains rope. The relationship between the Witness's nature and these perceptions is one of necessary concomitance and absence—when the first is present, the second is present; when the first is absent, the second is absent. (Surely these perceptions would not have arisen had the rope not existed.) It is through this very reasoning that we understand the Witness to be the non-dual Self. This is what the second verse teaches.
Perceptions and forms vary by virtue of differences in color—blue, yellow—and in shape—gross, subtle, short, long, and so forth. The word "and so forth" here encompasses all manner of forms: curved, circular, and every other kind.
"In manifold forms"—when one eye perceives all these vessels, which mutually contradict one another, it is "in a single manner"—the eye itself remains of one nature, that is, invariable (incapable of being suspended or altered by any contrary cause, and undergoing no coalescence or transformation even undetected; it remains fixed, eternal, unchanged, undifferentiated). There is no evidence that form exists outside the eye; for perception or apprehension of form occurs only when the eye perceives, and at no other time.
Recognition—when one sees again what has been seen before and thinks, "I have seen this before"—is what we call recognition. Through this is proven that the object seen before was real, that is, it possessed actual existence outside the mind. By this standard, such recognition either receives another form of validation (reasoning, proof, determination, philosophical conclusion, settlement, attainment, arrangement) or stands refuted (as a departure from the previous conclusion).
(The metrical portions of the Vedas are called 'Mantras,' and their interpretive portions are called 'Brahmanas.' What appears briefly in the Mantras unfolds in elaborate detail in the Brahmanas. In creating the Vedas—this harmonious unity of Mantras and Brahmanas—the Divine required no exertion whatsoever. Just as living creatures exhale breath without conscious effort, so too did the Divine effortlessly manifest the Vedas. Any statement from other scriptures, should it contradict direct perception or inference or the Vedas themselves, loses all force as evidence. But the Vedas do not await corroboration from other sources. What is proclaimed in the Vedas stands as proof in and of itself. Should any portion of the Vedas appear to contradict direct perception or inference, we must not therefore dismiss it as lacking authority. Rather, we must understand that either we have failed to grasp the Vedas' true meaning, or our direct perception contains some flaw—as a mirage deceives the eye—or some error has crept into our linguistic knowledge or our reasoning. In truth, the Vedas are infallible and independent of all other proofs. That Source from which these self-evidencing Vedas have emerged must surely be all-knowing.)
Consider this example. Someone perceives a pearl within an oyster shell. There—in that very place—the perception arises and persists for some duration. But before knowledge of how a pearl forms within an oyster, or reflection upon it, or memory can take hold and block that perception, the eye turns away to observe other objects. Then it falls back upon the oyster. The eye's defect—that illusion by which it saw a pearl—remains uncorrected. And now the mind recognizes it: "This is that very pearl." (When our mind has formed a false or mistaken judgment about something, and before we can properly know the truth of it, other objects or occurrences distract our view, then should that original person or thing or occurrence suddenly catch our eye again, what our mind declares at that moment arises from recognition—and is therefore undoubtedly erroneous.)
In such cases, recognition cannot be counted as valid proof, for the superimposed object's being rests upon what merely appears real—upon appearance itself, or upon 'individual apprehension' (which, even if false, seems true to the mind). As long as we have not truly known the nature of the substrate (that upon which the apprehension arose), whenever some particular thing appears in it, or whenever before we can know that appearance to be contradicted or false, another illusion arises—like or unlike the former—that illusion born of recognition is nothing but error, not truth. Thus in this case, within the perceiver and the other senses lies the imagined or inferred existence of the perceived object, which, though not real, seems real only because of recognition's deception.
Though a later perception may resemble or correspond to an earlier one, should these two be deemed different and thus invalid as proof, then the knowledge of the seen and the seer reveals itself not as whole and unified in the perceiver, but as fragmented and erroneous. By this logic, the Self—which exists as singular, eternal, undivided, real, and homogeneous consciousness—becomes the locus of all manner of delusion. At this stage, therefore, when the senses act as perceiver, we must proceed to the next level, conceding that our conclusion contains no flaw—accepting this reasoning and advancing further. When at one moment the sight of a rope begets the perception of a serpent (the earlier perception), and at another moment the same rope begets the perception of a garland (the later perception), and thus at different times different perceptions arise, such an occurrence constitutes error born of recognition itself, and it reveals the perceiver's (the eye's) fragmented and erroneous nature. Through the confluence of memory and discrimination, the invalid can be elevated to the status of the valid.