摩訶止觀 3.245

3.245

若古昔為初業者，先發菩提心，早知常住；畏怖生死，退大取小。法才王子及《涅槃》中退轉菩薩，從初已來，歸依一體三寶，熏修戒善。有受法，無捨法；心無盡故，戒亦無盡；一切戒善為此所熏。譬如大地冥益樹木；樹木萌芽悉得成就。小乘歸戒不離菩薩戒，菩薩戒力能成就之，即此義也。若不作初業知常，三藏歸戒羯磨悉不成就。若作此釋，於大小兩經義無相違。

If [we take] the distant past as the initial practice: having previously generated the bodhimind, they long ago knew the eternally abiding; terrified of birth and death, they regressed from the great and adopted the small. Prince Fatian and the retrogressing bodhisattvas in the Nirvāṇa-sūtra, from the beginning onward, took refuge in the single-essence Three Jewels and cultivated precepts and goodness. There is the receiving of the dharma, but no abandoning of the dharma; because the mind is inexhaustible, the precepts are also inexhaustible; all precepts and goodness are perfumed by this. For instance, the great earth secretly benefits trees; the buds and sprouts of the trees all reach completion. The refuges and precepts of the Small Vehicle do not depart from the bodhisattva precepts, and the power of the bodhisattva precepts can accomplish them—such is this meaning. If one does not take the initial practice to know the eternal, the karmavācanā for the Tripiṭaka refuges and precepts would all be unaccomplished. If one makes this interpretation, there is no contradiction between the meanings of the two sūtras of the great and small.