The all-pervasiveness of the Principle of Consciousness is indicated here in the inimitable style borrowed from the Upanishads.
WITHOUT AND WITHIN ALL THINGS — The Conscious Principle that bursts Itself into activity through the various individualised equipments is all-pervading and is, therefore, in an unmanifest condition. It is present even where no special equipment is available. Even though we can listen to our national radio broadcasts only through available receiving sets, we cannot say that there are no electrical sound-waves in places where there are no receiving sets. Where there is a body, mind and intellect ready to function, there, no doubt, is the expression of Consciousness. But Consciousness is All-pervading not only within the equipment but even outside it.
The phrase quoted can also be interpreted as ‘WITHOUT THE BEINGS AND YET WITHIN THEM ALSO.’ Something like this: the ocean is without the waves and is something other than the waves and, yet, the very mass of each wave is nothing but the ocean itself.
MOVING AND UNMOVING — All that moves of its own volition is “alive” and that which has no motion falls under the category of the “inert”. This phrase is sometimes explained as “UNMOVING AND YET MOVING,” wherein the Truth, in Its Absolute nature is motionless — there is no place where It can move since It is All — yet, conditioned by the things moving, IT LOOKS AS THOUGH it has movement. SITTING in a bus you can TRAVEL a long distance; yourself only sitting! Thus the bus travels, and therefore, in yourself though there is no motion, yet you, conditioned by (meaning, carried by) the bus, are the traveller.
Thus there is an Eternal, All-perfect Principle, revelling as the very core in our personality, which is not only within but which is everywhere — without which no activity is ever possible, and so, which is in every activity. It is manifested everywhere. Then how is it that we are not able to perceive It, or feel It, or intellectually comprehend It? — “BECAUSE OF ITS INCOMPREHENSIBLE SUBTLETY.”
The grosser the thing, the more perceptible it is. Earth can be smelt, can be tasted, can be seen, can be heard. Water cannot be smelt. Fire cannot be tasted. Air cannot be seen. Space has only sound as its property.
Cause is always subtler than effect. Space itself being a gross product, it must have a cause. That which is the cause for Akasha is the Eternal Substratum, from which all the Elements have arisen. Consciousness being thus the “subtlest of the subtle,” pervading even Akasha, It is incomprehensible to the gross equipments of thought, feeling and perception.
IT IS FAR AND NEAR — Limited and conditioned things can be defined by their location in space as “here” or “there.” And with reference to their distance from the observer, we can say they are near or far. But that which is All-pervading must be at once “here” and “there.” And therefore, it is NEAR AND FAR. This phrase also has been sometimes interpreted as “FAR AND YET NEAR.” “FAR”: in its Transcendental Absolute nature the Truth is FAR AWAY from all the hallucinations of names and forms, which, in their aggregate, constitute the Universe, but at the same time as Existence, Truth exists in every name and form: “NEAR.”
In short, this verse, in its staggering beauty arising out of its deliberate language of contradiction, shakes the reader from his intellectual complacency and whips him up to reflect and to realise that the Absolute Reality is at once transcendent and immanent.
THIS BRAHMAN, WHICH CAN BE REALISED WITHIN OURSELVES AS SELF, IS ONE AND THE SAME IN ALL, AND REVELS AS THE SELF IN ALL. THIS IS EXPLAINED BELOW:
