鐔津文集 2.6

2.6

For governing humans and governing heaven, nothing is better than the five precepts and ten virtues. For cultivating the lesser-lesser sages and the lesser sages, nothing is more flourishing than the four truths and twelve conditions. For cultivating the great sages to proceed toward the greatly great sages, nothing is more flourishing than the six perfections and the myriad practices. As for the five precepts and ten virtues: separating them is how heaven is attained; combining them is how human life is sustained. Speaking of their successful outcomes, there are superior and inferior; speaking of their underlying basis, the Way of the great man is one. As for the four truths and twelve conditions: separating them pertains to the lesser sages; combining them pertains to the lesser-lesser sages. Speaking of their successful outcomes, there are flourishing and diminished; speaking of the vehicles they ride, the lesser sages and the lesser-lesser sages share the same Way. As for the six perfections: they are the head of the myriad practices and expand the myriad practices. Although the vehicles ridden by the great sages and the greatly great sages are slightly differentiated, when they transcend to the ultimate through the myriad practices, they are one with the greatly great sages. 'Myriad practices' means myriad virtues. The sage's goodness is enacted through spiritual wonder; adapting to changes and mounting transformations, there is nowhere it is not present. Therefore, the sage participates in the affairs of heaven and humans, yet heaven and humans cannot fathom him. Spirit is the wondrous; affairs are the coarse. The coarse is known only to humans; the wondrous is known only to sages. The world contends over other and self, disputing right and wrong over the affairs of Confucianism and Buddhism; yet those in the world who know only the affairs of Confucianism and Buddhism—how could they know that which molds and fashions Confucianism and Buddhism? All beings that possess consciousness spread across heaven and earth, pervading the unseen and the manifest, pervading the barbarians, birds, and beasts. If not embraced comprehensively through the divine way, then from ancient times to the present there would almost certainly be abandoned creatures. The sage values possessing the same consciousness and fears leaving creatures behind; therefore, the sage acts through the divine way.