龍舒增廣淨土文 6.48

6.48

All who recite sūtras or observe the vegetarian feast days and precepts are certainly performing wholesome karma, and in future lives they will surely receive meritorious retribution—there is no doubt about it. Yet this retribution has an end and cannot liberate them from saṃsāra. If they further cultivate the West, they will immediately transcend saṃsāra. If even evil and sinful people who cultivate it can still attain rebirth, how much more so for those who observe the vegetarian feast days and recite sūtras—their rebirth in the highest grade is certain! Even so, the merit of cultivating alone is small, whereas the merit of exhorting others to cultivate is great. If one can widely exhort others, causing them mutually to exhort and transform more people, then because one observes the vegetarian feast days and recites sūtras oneself, others will surely trust and respect one's words, and the merit will be all the greater. In the present life one will receive the retribution of being revered and taken refuge in; how could one's merit and virtue after death ever end?