萬松老人評唱天童覺和尚頌古從容庵錄 3.76

3.76

The Master said: An imperial decree covers the realm, but the king does not travel through it. In the 'Black Robes' chapter of the *Book of Rites*, the Master said: 'The king's words are like silk; issued forth, they become cords. The king's words are like cords; issued forth, they become ropes. Therefore the great man does not initiate idle words.' When Sāgara emerges from the ocean, the garuda takes authority; once the commands are apportioned, lord and minister have fixed positions. Feng Tang said: 'When ancient kings dispatched a general, they knelt and pushed the chariot-wheel, saying: "Within the threshold, We control it; outside the threshold, the general controls it."' Wei Zhao said: 'This is the threshold of the outer city gate.' 'Thunder startles from hibernation' praises this monk for poking his head out too far; not waiting for the Awakening of Insects in the second month's solar node, he raised the dragon head early, not knowing that drifting clouds were about to follow the dragon's course, yet stopped short by the awe-inspiring wind of the garuda, unaware of bumping his head. Some say that were it not for the monk's verbal defeat, how could Xingyang's sharp dynamic be revealed? The four characters 'not waiting, how know' are extremely unsteady and jarring. 'Continuous beneath the loom'—this is not the dynamic of sharp dynamics (*jifeng*); it means beneath the brocade loom there must be the needle and thread of a skillful woman. My late teacher Xueyan once cited: 'The minute eye of the golden needle just exposes its tip; the long luster of the jade thread subtly penetrates the pass.' This is the bloodstream of the Dong school; unless one is a person within it, it is not easy to know. Facing the seal, not facing the wind—like a seal stamping empty space, it displays no patterning. Cang Jie gazed up at the rounded curves of the Andromeda constellation (*kui*) and observed below the forms of turtle markings and bird tracks; widely gathering multiple excellences, he combined them into writing. Later from tadpole script came the two seal scripts: King Xuan of Zhou's grand scribe Zhou created the great seal script; Li Si, chancellor of Qin, created the small seal script. The seal script of today is called 'square filling'. But tell me: did Xingyang carve and engrave after all? Pure white jade originally has no flaw; carving patterns destroys the gentleman's virtue.