龍舒增廣淨土文 3.10

3.10

In this world, human lives are all like water bubbles, arising and perishing without permanence. Some last one or two years, some ten or twenty; to fortunately reach forty or fifty is already difficult. Though there are those who reach seventy, since ancient times they have been rare. People only see the elderly before their eyes, never considering that those who pass away before growing old are many. Moreover, the mundane world is nothing but suffering, yet because people do not reflect, they are not aware of it. Times of adversity are certainly suffering; even if things go as wished, it does not last long. Parents, wives, children, and kin either die of illness, are harmed and separated, or one's own end arrives suddenly. How could one's lifelong sins and transgressions be completely absent? Taking only the present as an example: giving rise to a single improper thought, speaking a single improper word, looking upon a single improper form, listening to a single improper sound, or doing a single improper deed—none of these are not faults and evils. Furthermore, what one eats is the flesh of sentient beings, and what one wears is also obtained by killing sentient beings; what is more, all one's faults and evils do not stop at eating meat. If one does not think on it, it passes; but once one reflects on it, it is truly terrifying! Accumulated in abundance from youth to old age and from birth to death, entangled and solid, there is no way to liberation. After closing one's eyes, one cannot avoid following karmic conditions, departing into obscurity and gloom, not knowing where one will be. One may fall into hell to suffer extreme torments, or become an animal to be slaughtered by humans, or be born as a hungry ghost with the fire of hunger burning one's body, or enter the asuras, oppressed by wrath and hatred. Though there may be good karma by which one is born in the heavens or the human realm, once that blessed reward is exhausted, one transmigrates as before, drifting and sinking with no time of release. Only the Western Pure Land is the utmost shortcut to transcend transmigration. A physical body is difficult to obtain; while healthy and strong, accomplish this great matter! One should constantly reflect: 'Since beginningless time I have transmigrated through the six destinies and never knew this Dharma door, hence I could not escape. Today, having learned of it, how could I not set to work immediately?' The aged should indeed exert themselves, and the young must not procrastinate either. When life ends, go directly to rebirth in Sukhāvatī; looking back at those who die, enter the underworld, see King Yama, and undergo terrors, the two cannot be spoken of in the same breath.