Tathā svapne’tra vedyaṁ tu na sthiraṁ jāgare sthiram, tad behdo’tastayoḥ saṁvid ekarūpa na bhidyate (4). The difference between waking and dreaming is that waking looks like a longer experience, and dream is often considered to be shorter in comparison with waking. But that is a different matter. In the same way as we have diversity of perception in waking, there is diversity of perception in dream also. In dream we also have mountains and rivers and people, and all kinds of things. How do we know them? We have got a dream eye, dream ear, dream taste, dream touch, and so on. The mind in dream manufactures a new set of senses which are not the waking senses; and these sense organs specially created by the mind in the dreaming condition become the sources of the diversity of perception of dream objects. Even here, in order to know that there is a variety and diversity of objects in dream, there has to be a consciousness. Just as in the case of waking, the consciousness in dream is different from the variety we see in dream.

Also, the same person wakes and the same person dreams. On the one hand, consciousness is different from the variety of objects and the sensations thereof; and on the other hand, consciousness is different from waking and dreaming. It is not involved either in waking or in dreaming because it knows the difference between waking and dreaming. We know that we dreamt; we know that we are awake. Who are we that make this statement that waking is different from dream?

So consciousness does two things at the same time. It distinguishes between objects and transcends the objects by standing above them. Secondly, it distinguishes the states of consciousness (waking, dream and sleep) and stands above them as turiya – that is, the fourth state of consciousness.

The difference between waking and dream is only a question of shorter or longer duration, though in dream also we can have long durations of experience. But in comparison with the waking, we find that we slept for a few minutes and had a long dream; and a few minutes are very short in comparison with the twenty-four hours of waking. So apart from the fact of the difference in duration between waking and dream, the consciousness operating behind the senses of perception both in waking and dream is identical.

Supot thitasya sauṣpta tamo bodho bhavet smṛtiḥ, sā cāva buddha viṣayā’vabuddhaṁ tattadā tamaḥ (5). In waking, we have one kind of consciousness. In dream, we have another kind of consciousness. In sleep, we do not have any kind of consciousness. There is a darkness, a kind of ignorance in the state of deep sleep. But it is surprising that we all know that we were awake, we were dreaming, and we were sleeping. Granted, there was a kind of consciousness in waking, as it has been explained, and there was also the same consciousness operating in dream. But there was no consciousness in sleep. How did we know then, that we have slept? Knowledge of having slept cannot be there unless consciousness was there.

In waking, there are physical objects before consciousness. In dream there are mental objects before consciousness. The object before consciousness in sleep is ignorance; a cloud‑like covering over consciousness is the object. The consciousness knows that it knew nothing. It is a negative kind of consciousness. It is worthwhile analysing into the circumstance of our being aware that we slept, because sleeping is an absence of consciousness. And the fact of our having slept coming to us as a memory thereafter is something interesting.

We know what memory is. Memory, or remembrance, is the aftermath of a conscious experience that we had earlier. We remember a thing after having experienced a thing before; and if we did not have any kind of experience at all, the memory of it would not be there. So to assert that we slept yesterday, we must have had an awareness of having slept. But unfortunately, awareness of having slept is not possible because during sleep the consciousness did not actually ‘know’ the condition of sleep. We have to analyse by a fact of inference that consciousness must have been there because unconscious experience is unknown. All experience capable of a remembrance or memory afterwards has to be attached to consciousness.

By an act of inference, when we see muddy water in the Ganga, we infer that it must be raining upstream. And so in a similar manner we infer – not by direct experience, of course - by inference we realise and affirm that consciousness must have been there in deep sleep also – but for which fact, memory of sleeping would not be there afterwards.

So what follows from this? Consciousness was in waking, dream and sleep continuously. This is the reason why we feel we are the person who was awake; we are the same person that dreamt; we are the same person that slept. It does not mean somebody is waking, somebody else is dreaming, and yet somebody else is sleeping. It is not three different persons doing that. One continuous identity of personality is maintained by consciousness.

So what is the analysis now? Consciousness is continuously present in all the three states and, therefore, it constitutes a fourth state. It is not any one of the states. If consciousness were completely absorbed and identified with waking only, it would not be working in dream. And similarly, if it had been exhausted in one of the other conditions, dream or sleep, it would not have known other conditions. Inasmuch as consciousness knows all three conditions, it shows that it is none of the three conditions. It is a fourth state of consciousness, a transcendent element in us, or a transcendent element which we ourselves are. We are that transcendent consciousness, basically. We are not that which is involved in waking, dream and sleep. We are consciousness. This is the analysis here by examining the conditions of waking, dream and sleep.

Inasmuch as consciousness alone was there in sleep, we have to know something about what kind of consciousness it was. It could not be a consciousness that was in some place only, in a particular location. The peculiar character of consciousness is that it cannot be located in a particular place. It cannot be only in one place. It has to be everywhere. If consciousness is assumed to be present in one place only, there must be somebody to know that it is not elsewhere. Who is telling us that consciousness is only inside the body and it is not elsewhere? Consciousness itself is telling that.

It is necessary for consciousness to overstep the limits of its bodily encasement in order to know that it is only inside. We cannot know that there is a limitation of something within a fence unless and until we also know that there is something beyond the fence. The consciousness of finitude implies the consciousness of the Infinite. The impossibility of dividing consciousness into parts, fragments, and locating it in particular individuals makes it abundantly the Infinite that it is.

So we are actually entering into the infinite consciousness in the state of deep sleep; but because of the potentials of our karmas, prarabdha, etc., which cover our consciousness as darkness – the unfulfilled desires, the unconscious layer, as it is called in psychoanalysis – because of this covering, we do not know what is happening to us. We are actually on the lap of Brahman in that state of deep sleep. But blindfolded we go, and therefore it is as good as not going.

Consciousness has been analysed in these three verses as firstly, distinct from objects of perception; secondly, distinct from the three states; thirdly, infinite in nature. Such is the grandeur of our essential being. We are basically infinite consciousness. This is the reason why we ask for endless things. We want to possess the whole world. Even if we become kings of the earth, we are not satisfied because the Atman inside is infinite. It says, "Do you give me only the earth? I want the skies." If you give the sky, it will say, "I want further up." That is the asking for infinitude.

The Atman is also eternity. It is not bound by time. Therefore, we do not want to die. That desire to be immortal, the desire not to die, the desire to be existing for all time to come, endlessly, is the eternity in us that is speaking. Therefore, every one of us is basically infinite and eternal, whose nature is consciousness; and it is Absolute because of the infinitude of its nature.