During the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country; and at length fo... Read more of The Fall Of The House Of Usher at Scary Stories.ca

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Samurai

The World Is In The Making
Our assertion is far from assuming that life is now complete,...

Everything Is Living According To Zen
Everything alive has a strong innate tendency to preserve its...

The Establishment Of The Rin Zai School Of Zen In Japan
[FN#67] The Lin Tsi school was started by Nan Yoh, a pr...

Man Is Bad-natured According To Siun Tsz
The weaknesses of Mencius's theory are fully exposed by anot...

Epicureanism And Life
There are a good many people always buoyant in spirit and mir...

The Fifth And The Sixth Patriarchs
Tao Sin transmitted the Law to Hung Jan (Ko-nin), who being e...

Idealistic Scepticism Concerning Objective Reality
But extreme Idealism identifies 'to be' with 'to be known,' a...

Missionary Activity Of The Sixth Patriarch
As we have seen above, the Sixth Patriarch was a great genius...

The Mystery Of Life
Thus far we have pointed out the inevitable conflictions in l...

Let Go Of Your Idle Thoughts
[FN#263] A famous Zenist, Mu-go-koku-shi, is said to ha...

How To Worship Buddha
The author of Vimalakirtti-nirdeca-sutra well explains our at...

The Next Step In The Mental Training
In the next place we have to strive to be the master of our b...

Man Is Not Good-natured Nor Bad-natured But Buddha-natured
We have had already occasion to observe that Zen teaches Bud...

Zazen Or The Sitting In Meditation
Habit comes out of practice, and forms character by degrees, ...

Introduction Of Zen Into China By Bodhidharma
An epoch-making event took place in the Buddhist history of C...

Each Smile A Hymn Each Kindly Word A Prayer
The glorious sun of Buddha-nature shines in the zenith of Enl...

No Need Of The Scriptural Authority For Zen
Some Occidental scholars erroneously identify Buddhism with t...

The Eternal Life As Taught By Professor Munsterberg
Some philosophical pessimists undervalue life simply because ...

Do Thy Best And Leave The Rest To Providence
There is another point of view which enables us to enjoy life...

The Ancient Buddhist Pantheon
The ancient Buddhist pantheon was full of deities or Buddhas,...

Poetical Intuition And Zen

Since Universal Life or Spirit permeates the universe, the poetical
intuition of man never fails to find it, and to delight in everything
typical of that Spirit. The leaves of the plantain, says a Zen
poet, unfold themselves, hearing the voice of thunder. The flowers
of the hollyhock turn towards the sun, looking at it all day long.
Jesus could see in the lily the Unseen Being who clothed it so
lovely. Wordsworth found the most profound thing in all the world to
be the universal spiritual life, which manifests itself most directly
in nature, clothed in its own proper dignity and peace. Through
every star, says Carlyle, through every grass blade, most through
every soul, the glory of present God still beams.

It is not only grandeur and sublimity that indicate Universal Life,
but smallness and commonplace do the same. A sage of old awakened to
the faith[FN#151] when he heard a bell ring; another, when he looked
at the peach blossom; another, when he heard the frogs croaking; and
another, when he saw his own form reflected in a river. The minutest
particles of dust form a world. The meanest grain of sand under our
foot proclaims a divine law. Therefore Teu Tsz Jo-shi), pointing to
a stone in front of his temple, said: All the Buddhas of the past,
the present, and the future are living therein.[FN#152]

[FN#151] Both the Chinese and the Japanese history of Zen are full
of such incidents.

[FN#152] Zen-rin-rui-shu and To-shi-go-roku.

Next: Enlightened Consciousness
Previous: Universal Life Is Universal Spirit

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