宏智禪師廣錄 6.5

6.5

The place of genuine practice is solely silent sitting and silent investigation. Penetrating deeply to where one attains: outwardly, one is not turned by causes and conditions. When the mind is empty, it contains; when its illumination is wondrous, it hits the mark. Inwardly, there are no thoughts of grasping at conditions; vast and solitary, it remains without stupor. Spiritually alive and beyond duality, it is self-attained. The place of attainment does not belong to sentiment; it must be spacious and open, entirely without reliance. Towering and distinctly spiritual on its own, only then does it avoid following defiled characteristics. When one can rest at this place, it is pristine and bright; bright and unobstructed, one is then able to adapt and respond, returning to face affairs. Affair after affair is unobstructed, like clouds drifting out of the mountain peaks, or the moon washed clean in a flowing stream. In all places, spiritual transformations of bright illumination are completely without obstructing signs, tallying exactly like a box and its lid or the tips of two arrows meeting. Furthermore, make your training mature and your realization stable; in every place, it will be clearly distinct, without corners or edges, free of conceptual principles. Proceeding in this way, like a white ox or a house cat, one is called a fellow who is completely accomplished. Therefore it is said: 'A person of the mindless Way is capable of this; yet before one has attained mindlessness, it is indeed exceedingly difficult.'