肇論新疏 1.296

1.296

The first sentence covers the preceding four sentences, because the previous treatise does not go beyond being and non-being. The next clause, "contradictory", means mutually opposing; it is like saying, "how could it merely be an assertion of mutual opposition between being and non-being?" The subsequent six sentences comprehensively set forth the character of the mutual opposition of being and non-being in the treatise. In the first three sentences, "if they ought to be" covers the first and third sentences above. "Then they are being" means that they definitely ought to be only being. "One ought not to speak of non-being" covers the second and fourth sentences above: how could one then conversely speak of non-being? In the latter three sentences, "if they ought to be non-being" covers the second and fourth sentences above. "Then they are non-being" means that they definitely ought to be only non-being. "One ought not to speak of being" covers the first and third sentences above: how could one then conversely speak of being? The above discriminates and determines the mutual opposition. Below, it reveals that conditioned phenomena are endowed with both being and non-being, meaning that whether [regarded as] being or [regarded as] non-being, both possess their principle and are not mutually opposed.