弘明集 5.17

5.17

答曰。子之難辯則辯矣。未本諸心。故有若斯之難乎。夫萬化皆有也。榮枯盛衰死生代互。一形盡一形生。此有生之終始也。至於水火則彌貫群生瞻而不匱。豈非火體因物水理虛順。生不自生而為眾生所資。因即為功。故物莫能竭乎。同在生域其妙如此。況神理獨絕。器所不隣。而限以生表冥盡神無所寄哉因斯而談。太極為兩儀之母。兩儀為萬物之本。彼太極者渾元之氣而已。猶能總此化根不變其一。矧神明靈極有無兼盡者耶。其為不滅可以悟乎。

I answered: 'Your objection is eloquent indeed, but you have not rooted it in the mind; hence you raise such an objection. The myriad transformations are all existent things. Flourishing and withering, thriving and decaying, death and life alternate: one corporeal form is exhausted, and another corporeal form is born; this is the beginning and end of what has life. As for water and fire, they thoroughly penetrate all living beings, sustaining them without exhaustion. Is it not that the essence of fire depends on objects, while the principle of water is empty and compliant? They do not give birth to themselves, yet are relied upon by all living beings; relying on them constitutes their efficacy, and therefore things cannot exhaust them. Even within the realm of life, their subtlety is such; how much more so for the principle of the spirit, which is uniquely transcendent, beyond the neighborhood of vessels! How could one limit it by saying that beyond life it is darkly exhausted and the spirit has nowhere to lodge? Speaking from this: the Great Ultimate is the mother of the Two Modes, and the Two Modes are the root of the myriad things. That Great Ultimate is merely the primordial qi of the chaotic origin, yet it can subsume the roots of these transformations without altering its oneness. How much more so for the spirit's brightness and luminous ultimate, which fully exhaust both being and non-being? Can its indestructibility not be realized from this?'