虛堂和尚語錄 1.25

1.25

At an informal gathering on the Winter Solstice: 'Heaven and earth are not benevolent; they treat the myriad things as straw dogs. Patch-robed monks are not benevolent; they treat themselves as fans in the twelfth month. Therefore, muddled and indistinct, they use it daily without knowing it. Thus the ancient style is revived once more, and the great simplicity is fully displayed; when the single breath without speaking arises from the bottom of the nine abysses, the initial line without form originates as the ancestor of ten thousand transformations. As before, midwinter is severely cold, and again we see the cloth for cooking rice in Guozhou. How can one avoid falling into change and transition? Whimpering and sighing, it can only be known by oneself.'