Paul Brunton Philosophic Foundation homepage > Notebooks of Paul Brunton

---

Atman--one of the most important and basic doctrines in Sanskrit learning. To take Atman as self is to confirm and strengthen the very error which the doctrine of Atman seeks to refute! Such a procedure imbues the mind anew with the thought of "I." For in Atman there can be no such thing as a personal entity, no existence of an ego at all. Those who have studied both the Hindu Upanishads and the Buddhist Abhidhamma sufficiently and profoundly cannot fail to observe that Atman is merely the intellectual parallel and counterpart of Nirvana. And who has more strongly fought the belief in self than Buddha?

-- Notebooks Category 15: The Orient > Chapter 2 : India Part 1 > # 277 -- Perspectives > Chapter 15: The Orient > # 56