弘明集 2.11

2.11

I reply: "The emergence of teachings and transformations each points to what they correspond to. When the world was seeking order amidst disorder, what the Zhu and Si rivers promoted corresponded to the way of governance. When the pure customs became increasingly decayed, the two chapters [of the Daodejing] were written in order to quiet movement. If Yan Hui, Ran Geng, Zai Yu, Duanmu Ci, Yin Xi, and Zhuang Zhou had outwardly praised the traces of Confucianism and the Daoist mystery in order to guide what worldly feelings could reach, while inwardly receiving the study of the unarisen to seek it through the principle of the spirit, who in the world would have recognized it? As for the likes of Ran Ji, Ziyou, Zixia, Zisi, Meng Ke, Linzong, Kangcheng, Master Gai, Yan Ping, Ban Si, Yang Xiong, and Wang Chong, some reached their limits within ritual teachings, while others fulfilled themselves in unbridled retirement, feeling no joy in the Buddha Dharma. These were all where their sparse conditions reached an end; they never transgressed their bounds. Therefore, when Confucius and Laozi uttered teachings to guide them, it was reached by the stimulation and inclination of such men; hence they did not overstep to strike and excessively respond. Confucianism promotes humaneness; the Dao lies in restraining movement. Both have already grasped the limits of teaching, and none exceeded their ultimate. Although benevolence and non-action flow together with the Buddha's teachings, the Dharma body and Nirvāṇa were not things that could be fully spoken of to them, and thus they did not illuminate them. Moreover, whenever one speaks of 'doing nothing yet leaving nothing undone,' how does that differ in purport from the Dharma body being without form yet universally entering everything? Therefore, although Confucius, Laozi, and the Tathāgata took different paths in their three teachings, in practicing good they walked side by side."