  As was the case with Candrakīrti’s Madhyamakāvatāra, Śāntideva’s Bodhicaryāvatāra has the most to say about Madhyamaka philosophy in the chapter on the pefection of wisdom. A key verse in this chapter is 9.35, which says “When neither presence nor absence stands before the mind, the mind, having no content, calms down because of the absence of cognition.” This recapitulates a point made by both Nāgārjuna and Candrakīrti that the ultimate goal of Buddhist practice is nirvana, a stillness of the mind in which there is no object being grasped as the focus of awareness, no narratives (prapañca) being told to account for one’s experience, no theorizing and no argumentation. At the outset of the chapter on wisdom Śāntideva says that the ultimate truth is of a reality that is not within range of the intellect; the intellect operates only at the level of conventional truth. In this world there are two kinds of human being, which Śāntideva calls ordinary people (prākṛta loka) and meditators (yogin). The ordinary people are those who see the world in terms of presences and absences, being and non-being, but the conventional truths in which they trade are set aside by the truths of the meditators. The principal delusion of those who rely on conventional truths is that they mistakenly believe that prospositions conventionally accepted as truth are grounded in the natures of things. Meditators, on the other hand, come to realize that things do not have inherent natures. That things do not have inherent natures cannot be established directly, but attempts to show that things do have inherent natures can be shown to be faulty. One who has cultivated the intention to become enlightened in order to lead others out of their delusion-driven suffering uses language to help people realize the limitations of language and conceptual thinking. In taking this approach, Śāntideva is clearly following the lead of Buddhapālita and Candrakīrti.