What is seeing one's nature?

What is seeing the nature (见性)? Seeing the nature is a capacity for seeing dharmas. The eighth consciousness has the seeing nature, the seventh consciousness has the seeing nature, the sixth consciousness has the seeing nature, and each of the first five consciousnesses has its own seeing nature; the dharma-marks seen by the seeing natures of the eight consciousnesses are each different. After the seeing nature, the nature of consciousness emerges; once the nature of consciousness emerges, dharmas begin to move, and arising, abiding, changing, and ceasing begin to flow and turn.

The Buddha said: King Prasenajit, when you were three years old you saw the Ganges River, and when you were thirteen years old you saw the Ganges River — is there any difference in that seeing? King Prasenajit replied: There is no difference, and even compared with the seeing with which I now, at sixty-two years of age, see the Ganges River, there is also no difference; the seeing nature does not change. The Buddha said: This unchanging seeing nature is that imperishable you; whether you see or do not see, that seeing nature always exists and never perishes.

Then what kind of seeing is the seeing of the Ganges River? Does the eighth consciousness see the Ganges River? If the eighth consciousness does not see the Ganges River, how could the fifth, sixth, and seventh consciousnesses see the Ganges River? If the eighth consciousness sees the Ganges River, what need is there for the fifth, sixth, and seventh consciousnesses to see the Ganges River? What exactly is the case?

From the similar image transformed and manifested after the eighth consciousness sees, all the way into the supreme faculty (indriya), and then all the way to the fifth and sixth consciousnesses seeing the image, the seventh consciousness has been seeing all along, never shifting away. If the seventh consciousness did not see, there would be no fifth and sixth consciousnesses, let alone the seeing of the fifth and sixth consciousnesses. And the eighth consciousness, from beginning to end, has not been without seeing for even a single instant; otherwise, how could the fifth, sixth, and seventh consciousnesses see?