弘明集 3.5

3.5

Now, the Buddha is one who embodies the Dao. The Dao is that which guides creatures. Responding to stimuli and according with unobstructed passage, it acts through non-action yet leaves nothing undone. Because it is non-action, it is empty, tranquil, and natural. Because it leaves nothing undone, it divinely transforms the myriad things. The demands of the myriad things differ in being low or high; hence the methods of instructing and guiding them are either subtle or crude. When awakening those of superior understanding, it sets forth the primary source. For those who are not compliant, retribution and disaster return to them: those who overindulge in wine are snared by punishment; intoxication becomes a major penalty. Thieves are brought to justice under the three penal codes and five punishments; once violated, there is no pardon. These are the regular regulations of monarchs, shared by governors and shepherds alike. If a sage king rules the world and the hundred officials are luminous and perceptive, then the aforementioned criminals will surely be thoroughly investigated, having nowhere to conceal themselves. If the treacherous and wicked are not allowed to indulge their private ends, then the state will have no rebellious subjects, and the virtuous will surely be praised and promoted. Furthermore, when the lord is enlightened and ministers are impartial, the world is pure and good order prevails; they are still able to ensure that good and evil find their proper places and that the crooked and straight are not confounded. How much more so when divine spirits preside, knowing neither near nor far, hidden nor deep, clear-sighted and upright, punishing evil and blessing good? Therefore, the merit of a hair's breadth and the fault of a tiny weight—the time of their retribution cannot fail or err. Reviewing the evidence of misfortune and fortune through antiquity and the present, all have their causes and conditions, brilliantly documented in the records; how could they be obscured? Why is it that the descendants of families plotting secret schemes do not prosper, and generals for three generations are expressly avoided by the Daoists? Is this not brought about by the fact that weapons are ominous, war is perilous, and killing has accumulated? As for Wei Ke following the instructions given in sound mind and thus obtaining the recompense of knotted grass, or Zidu keeping faith and receiving the gift of a fine piebald horse; Duke Xiang of Qi shifted blame and therefore met the disaster of falling from his carriage; Duke Hui of Jin abandoned propriety and therefore faced the distress of defeat at Han. These are all proofs of the dead rewarding or punishing the living. As for Xuan Meng pitying the starving man under the mulberry tree, and the washerwoman feeling sorrow for the exhaustion of the Lord of Huaiyin, both saved someone in desperate hunger with a single meal: Zhao received the boon of a reversed halberd, and the old woman enjoyed a reward of a thousand pieces of gold. This is obtaining ten thousandfold retribution from a single act, without it exceeding a single lifetime. Thus, when one establishes virtue in obscurity, its blessings manifest above the myriad things. Hidden actions shining in the open are of a natural tendency, just like scattering grains upon the soil and reaping a hundredfold harvest: the earth and the grain have no personal feelings toward humans, yet the natural benefit arrives.