西方合論 1.43

1.43

或曰：「此是眾生實報莊嚴，不同權教，推淨土於他方，是為實教。」或曰：「眾生雖具此實報，爭奈真如無性，不能自證。漫漫長夜，無見日期；波波劫海，無到岸期。雖云地獄起妙覺之心，佛果現泥犁之界，其如眼前銕床銅柱何哉？辟之餓鬼，渴死於海邊！貧人數錢於金窟，秖見其虛，何名為實？若非假之方便，由權入實，眾生豈有證毘盧之日也？」

Someone might say: "This is the real reward adornment of sentient beings; unlike the provisional teaching which defers the pure land to other realms, this is the real teaching." Another might say: "Although sentient beings possess this real reward, what can be done when tathatā is without self-nature, so that they cannot realize it themselves? In the long, endless night, there is no date of seeing the sun; in the tossing ocean of kalpas, there is no time of reaching the shore. Although it is said that the mind of wondrous enlightenment arises in hell, and the fruit of buddhahood is manifest in the realm of Niraya, how can that help in the face of the iron beds and copper pillars before one's eyes? Compare it to a hungry ghost dying of thirst by the sea shore, or a poor man counting money in a cavern of gold: one only sees its emptiness, so how can it be called real? Were it not for relying on skillful means to enter the real through the provisional, how could sentient beings ever have the day of realizing Vairocana?"