禪林寶訓 2.42

2.42

Fojian said: "Our late teacher was frugal: his single bowl bag and shoe sack had hundreds of patches and thousands of mends, yet he could not bear to cast them aside. He used to say, 'These two items have followed me since I left the pass, for nearly fifty years. How could I bear to abandon them midway?' There was Senior Monk Wu from southern Quanzhou who sent him a coarse cloth robe, saying of his own accord, 'I obtained it from overseas; it is warm in winter and cool in summer.' The late teacher said, 'In cold weather this old monk has firewood, charcoal, and a paper quilt; in hot weather I have the pine wind, water, and rocks. What would I store this for?' In the end, he declined it." (Rilu)