圓悟佛果禪師語錄 14.6

14.6

Zhaozhou said: 'I have seen hundreds of millions of people, all of whom were fellows seeking to become buddhas; among them, finding one who is without mind is truly rare.' He also said: 'For thirty years in the south, except for the two times of gruel and rice, nowhere did I apply my mind to mixed concerns.' Xianglin took forty years before he became of one piece; Yongquan after forty years was still making missteps; Nanquan at eighteen understood how to make his livelihood. One truly knows that among the ancients from antiquity, none failed to carry out their practice thoroughly and intimately like this. How could one calculate gain and loss, superiority and inferiority, or cling to notions of right and wrong and conceptual understanding? Among our fellow students, only Longmen Zhihai in the past thoroughly investigated and clarified this together with me; whenever he met with conditions and encountered circumstances, he never failed to sustain it. How could this be limited only to this life? Exhausting the bounds of the future, even if one realizes immeasurable holy bodies, that is still not his anchoring place. Just practice stepping back with single-minded devotion, and by all means do not set limits.