What Are the Dharma-Objects of Consciousness?

In the fifty-one mental factors, wholesome mental factors, afflictive mental factors, etc., correspond not only to consciousness but also to the mental faculty. The dharmas (objects) that consciousness perceives include form dharmas, mental dharmas, and also non-form non-mental dharmas, which are the twenty-four non-concurrent formations.

Form dharmas pertain to form, which is produced by the four great seeds; whatever relates to the four great seeds belongs to form dharmas. Whatever relates to the seeds of consciousness, the eight consciousnesses, or mental factors belongs to mental dharmas. All else constitutes non-form non-mental dharmas. When consciousness perceives its own mental dharmas such as greed, hatred, and delusion, this constitutes the function of introspection within consciousness, which is the self-witnessing division of consciousness. When consciousness observes the mental factors of other consciousnesses, it involves the perceiving division and the self-witnessing division, and all perceived objects in such cases are mental dharmas.