In Figurative Language we employ words in such a way that they differ somewhat from their ordinary signification in commonplace speech and convey our meaning in a more vivid and impressive manner than when we use them in their every-day s... Read more of FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE at Speaking Writing.com

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The Fourth Patriarch And The Emperor Tai Tsung (tai-so)
The Third[FN#40] Patriarch was succeeded by Tao Sin (Do-shin)...

Enlightenment Is Beyond Description And Analysis
In the foregoing chapters we have had several occasions to re...

The First Step In The Mental Training
Some of the old Zen masters are said to have attained to supr...

Man Is Both Good-natured And Bad-natured According To Yan Hiung
According to Yang Hiung and his followers, good is no less re...

Real Self
If there be no individual soul either in mind or body, where ...

The Spiritual Attainment Of The Sixth Patriarch
Some time before his death (in 675 A.D.) the Fifth Patriarch ...

Zazen And The Forgetting Of Self
Zazen is a most effectual means of destroying selfishness, th...

The Examination Of The Notion Of Self
The belief in immortality is based on the strong instinct of ...

Hinayanism And Its Doctrine
The doctrine of Transience was the first entrance gate of Hin...

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

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

The Buddha Of Mercy
Milton says: Virtue may be assailed, but never hurt; Surp...

The Third Step In The Mental Training
To be the lord of mind is more essential to Enlightenment, wh...

The Second And The Third Patriarchs
After the death of the First Patriarch, in A.D. 528, Hwui Ko ...

Zen Under The Toku-gana Shogunate
Peace was at last restored by Iye-yasu, the founder of the To...

Zen And Idealism
Next Zen makes use of Idealism as explained by the Dharmalaks...

Poetical Intuition And Zen
Since Universal Life or Spirit permeates the universe, the po...

All The Worlds In Ten Directions Are Buddha's Holy Land
We are to resume this problem in the following chapter. Suff...

The Theory Of Buddha-nature Adequately Explains The Ethical States Of Man
This theory of Buddha-nature enables us to get an insight int...

The Bad Are The Good In The Egg
This is not only the case with a robber or a murderer, but al...

Universal Life Is Universal Spirit

These considerations naturally lead us to see that Universal Life is
not a blind vital force, but Creative Spirit, or Mind, or
Consciousness, which unfolds itself in myriads of ways. Everything
in the universe, according to Zen, lives and acts, and at the same
time discloses its spirit. To be alive is identically the same as to
be spiritual. As the poet has his song, so does the nightingale, so
does the cricket, so does the rivulet. As we are pleased or
offended, so are horses, so are dogs, so are sparrows, ants,
earthworms, and mushrooms. Simpler the body, simpler its spirit;
more complicated the body, more complicated its spirit. 'Mind
slumbers in the pebble, dreams in the plant, gathers energy in the
animal, and awakens to self-conscious discovery in the soul of man.'

It is this Creative, Universal Spirit that sends forth Aurora to
illuminate the sky, that makes Diana shed her benign rays and Æolus
play on his harp, wreathes spring with flowers, that clothes autumn
with gold, that induces plants to put forth blossoms, that incites
animals to be energetic, and that awakens consciousness in man. The
author of Mahavaipulya-purnabuddha-sutra expressly states our idea
when he says: Mountains, rivers, skies, the earth: all these are
embraced in the True Spirit, enlightened and mysterious. Rin-zai
also says: Spirit is formless, but it penetrates through the world
in the ten directions.[FN#149] The Sixth Patriarch expresses the
same idea more explicitly: What creates the phenomena is Mind; what
transcends all the phenomena is Buddha.[FN#150]

[FN#149] Rin-zai-roku.

[FN#150] Roku-so-dan-kyo.

Next: Poetical Intuition And Zen
Previous: The Creative Force Of Nature And Humanity

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