Latter Collection 2 (nos. 46–90)後集

One who does not know a single written word, yet has the heart of poetry, grasps the true savor of the poets. One who has never pondered a single verse of scripture, yet has the taste of Chan, awakens to the hidden working of the Chan teaching.

In a person whose scheming mind is astir, the shadow of a bow is suspected to be a snake or a scorpion, and a stone lying in the grass is seen as a crouching tiger. All within them is the air of killing. In a person whose thoughts have come to rest, a stone tiger can be taken for a seagull and the croaking of frogs can serve as music. Wherever they touch, they see the true working of things.

The body is like a boat that is not moored; leave it to drift on or to halt at the shallows. The mind is like wood already burned to ash; what harm is there whether a knife cuts it or incense is smeared on it?

Human feeling delights to hear the oriole sing and is annoyed to hear the frog croak. It wishes to tend the flower it sees and to pull up the grass it meets. All of this is to act by shape and temper. But look at them with the nature that heaven gave, and which of them is not sounding its own heavenly working, not unfolding its own will to live?

When the hair falls and the teeth grow sparse, leave this phantom shape to its withering. In the singing of birds and the laughing of flowers, know the true suchness of your own nature.

For the person whose inside is full of desire, waves boil even in a cold pool, and they do not find stillness in the hills and woods. For the person whose inside is empty, coolness rises even in fierce heat, and they do not notice the din in the middle of the market.

One who hoards much loses much. So we know that wealth is not equal to the freedom from care of the poor. One who walks high falls quickly. So we know that rank is not equal to the constant ease of the lowly.

Reading the Book of Changes at the dawn window, one grinds red ink with dew gathered among the pines. Discoursing on the sutras at the midday desk, one lets the chiming stone send its note out on the wind beneath the bamboo.

A flower kept in a pot lacks living force in the end, and a bird put into a cage at once loses its natural charm. Better the flowers and birds of the hills, which mingle together into a pattern and soar as they please, and so of themselves meet the heart with ease.

People of the world only take the word "I" to be far too real. So they have all kinds of cravings and all kinds of troubles. An earlier writer said, "When one no longer knows that there is a self, how should one know that things are precious?" And again, "Know that this body is not the self, and how can trouble invade you?" These words truly hit the mark.

Look at youth from old age, and you can dissolve the mind that rushes about and contends. Look at glory from a withered place, and you can cut off thoughts of splendor and luxury.

Human feeling and the ways of the world change into ten thousand forms in a moment, and should not be taken as too real. Yaofu (堯夫) said, "What I called I in days past has now become another. I do not know whose the I of today will be hereafter." If a person always looks at things in this way, they can loosen the snares in their breast.

Set one cool eye in the midst of heat and bustle, and you spare yourself many a bitter thought. Keep one warm heart in a cold and lonely place, and you gain many a true delight.

Where there is one happy state, there is an unhappy one waiting to face it. Where there is one fine prospect, there is a poor one bound up with it. Only the plain food of an ordinary house and the scenery of a life without office make a nest of ease and joy.

Raise the blind high at the window, watch green hills and clear waters swallow and breathe out cloud and mist, and know how free heaven and earth are. Where bamboo and trees grow thick, let the nestling swallows and the cooing doves send off and greet the seasons, and know how both things and self are forgotten.

Know that what is made must fall, and the mind that seeks to make will not be too fixed. Know that what lives must die, and the way of keeping life will not be labored over.

An old master said, "The shadow of bamboo sweeps the steps, yet the dust does not stir. The disk of the moon pierces the pond, yet the water keeps no trace." Our Confucians say, "Let the stream run as fast as it will, the place around it is always still. Though the blossoms fall often, the mind of itself is at leisure." If a person always holds this thought in meeting things and dealing with affairs, how free body and heart become.

The note of the pines among the woods and the sound of the spring over the stones: hear them in stillness, and you know them for the natural chiming of the jade pendants of heaven and earth. The misty light at the edge of the grass and the shadow of clouds in the heart of the water: watch them at leisure, and you see the finest writing of heaven and earth.

One's eyes see the brambles that grew over the Western Jin, and still one boasts of one's naked blade. One's body will belong to the foxes and hares of Mount Beimang, and still one begrudges one's gold. The old saying runs, "A fierce beast is easily tamed, but the human heart is hard to subdue. A ravine is easily filled, but the human heart is hard to fill." How true it is.

When there is no wind or wave on the ground of the mind, then wherever you go there are green hills and green trees. When there is a breeding and nourishing power in the heaven of your nature, then wherever you touch you see the fish leap and the kite fly.

The scholar in high cap and broad sash, when once they see someone roaming free in a light straw cape and a small bamboo hat, can hardly help sighing with envy. The rich host of long banquets and wide mats, when once they meet someone sitting still and unhurried behind a thin blind at a clean desk, can hardly help longing for it. Why then do people drive themselves on like oxen set afire and let themselves be lured like horses in heat, and never think of living at ease in their own nature?

The fish gets water and swims, and forgets the water. The bird rides the wind and flies, and does not know there is wind. Know this, and you can rise above the burden of things and take joy in the working of heaven.

Foxes sleep on the broken pavement and hares run over the ruined terrace: all of it was once a place of song and dance. Dew lies cold on the yellow chrysanthemums and mist blurs the withered grass: all of it was once a field of battle. What is constant in rise and fall? Where are the strong and the weak now? Think of this, and the heart turns to ashes.

Unstartled by favor or disgrace, one watches at leisure the flowers open and fall before the courtyard. With no mind to go or to stay, one follows without care the clouds that gather and spread beyond the sky.

Under a clear sky and a bright moon, what heaven could it not fly in? Yet the moth alone throws itself into the candle at night. With clear springs and green plants, what could it not drink and peck? Yet the owl must have its rotten mouse. Alas, how many in this world are not moths and owls?

To think of leaving the raft the moment you have got on it is to be a person of the Way with nothing to do. To ride a donkey and go on looking for a donkey is to remain to the end a Chan master who has not awakened.

The powerful rear up like dragons and heroes fight like tigers; but look at them with a cool eye, and it is ants swarming to a rank smell, flies quarreling over blood. Right and wrong rise up like a swarm of bees, gain and loss bristle like the spines of a hedgehog; but meet them with a cool heart, and it is a furnace melting metal, boiling water melting snow.

Bound and chained by desire for things, you feel how pitiful your life is. Roaming at ease in the truth of your nature, you feel how joyful your life is. Know that it is pitiful, and worldly feeling breaks apart on the spot. Know that it is joyful, and the realm of the sages comes of itself.

When there is not half a speck of worldly desire in the breast, it is already like snow melting in the furnace flame, like ice melting in the sun. When a stretch of clear brightness lies of itself before the eyes, you always see the moon in the blue sky and its image on the waves.

Thoughts of poetry come on Baling Bridge; hum them softly, and the woods and peaks are already vast and free. The delight of the wilds comes at the bend of Jinghu; walk there alone, and the hills and streams light one another up.

The bird that has crouched long is sure to fly high; the flower that opens first alone falls early. Know this, and you can escape the fear of stumbling and dissolve impatient thoughts.

Only when the tree comes to the day of returning to its root is it known that blossom and calyx, branch and leaf were an empty glory. Only when a person's affairs come to the closing of the coffin lid is it known that children and jade and silk are of no use.

True emptiness is not empty. To cling to form is not the truth, and to break form is not the truth either. What then, one asks, did the World Honored One hand down? "Be in the world and yet beyond the world. To follow desire is suffering, and to cut off desire is suffering too. It rests with us to cultivate and hold ourselves well."

The ardent yield a state of a thousand chariots; the greedy fight over a single coin. In character they are as far apart as a star and an abyss, yet loving fame is no different from loving gain. The Son of Heaven manages house and state; the beggar cries out for their meals. In station they are as far apart as sky and earth, yet the burning of the one's thought is no different from the burning of the other's voice.

When you have tasted the world to the full, you leave it to turn rain and overturn cloud as it will, and grow too idle even to open your eyes. When you have understood human feeling to the end, you let them call you an ox or call you a horse, and only nod your head.

People today seek only to have no thoughts, and in the end they cannot be without them. Simply do not hold on to the thought that has passed, do not go out to meet the thought to come, and deal with the present as its occasion brings it. Then of themselves, little by little, they enter into no-thought.

Where the mind meets something by chance, a fine state comes of itself; where a thing comes out of its own nature, the true working is seen. Add a single measure of arranging and setting in order, and the flavor is already less. Bai Letian said, "The mind is at ease when there is nothing to do; the wind is clear when it blows of itself." How full of savor those words are.

When the heaven of your nature is clear through, then eating when hungry and drinking when thirsty are nothing but the easing of body and mind. When the ground of your mind is sunk in delusion, then though you discourse on Chan and expound the verses, it is all an idle toying with the spirit.

The human heart has one true realm. Without string or pipe it is calm and glad of itself; without incense or tea it is clear and fragrant of itself. Only when thought is made clean and the outer world made empty, when care is forgotten and the body let go, can one roam freely within it.

Metal comes out of ore, jade is born from stone: without the illusory there is no way to seek the true. The Way may be got in the midst of wine, an immortal may be met among the flowers: however refined a person is, they cannot leave the common world behind.

The ten thousand things in heaven and earth, the ten thousand feelings of human relations, the ten thousand affairs of the world: seen with common eyes they are confused and each unlike the rest; seen with the eye of the Way, every one of them is what it always is. Why trouble to divide them? What need to choose and discard?

When the spirit is content in a narrow bed under a hemp quilt, you receive the mild and harmonious breath of heaven and earth. When your taste is satisfied after a bowl of rice and goosefoot soup, you know the plain and simple truth of human life.

Bondage and release lie only in one's own mind. When the mind has awakened, the butcher's stall and the wine shop are a pure land just as they are. When it has not, then though a person keep one lute and one crane, one flower and one plant, and their pleasures be ever so clear, the hindrance of the demon remains to the end. The old saying runs, "One who can rest makes the world of dust a true realm; one who has not awakened makes the monastery a layman's house." How true it is.

Throw away all cares in a room the size of a peck measure, and what is the use of talking of clouds flying past painted beams and pearl blinds rolled up on the rain? Win one truth for yourself after three cups, and you will know only the plain lute laid across the moonlight and the short flute humming in the wind.

In the midst of the ten thousand sounds fallen silent, hear one bird suddenly try its voice, and it calls up many a hidden delight. After the ten thousand plants are broken and stripped bare, see one branch suddenly put out a fine shoot, and it stirs an endless force of life. So we see that the heaven of our nature is never withered, and that the spirit of its working is best drawn out by a touch.