坐禪三昧經 2.22

2.22

The answer is: "It is not so. Rāga should not be [considered] pleasure. Why? If rāga were internal, one should not externally seek female beauty; in externally seeking female beauty, one should know that lust is suffering. If lust were pleasure, one should not abandon it from time to time; if it is abandoned, it should not be pleasure. In the midst of great suffering, one takes small suffering as pleasure. Just as a person condemned to death has their life spared and receives a flogging, and takes this as pleasure. When the lustful mind blazes, one takes desire as pleasure; in old age, weary of desire, one knows that desire is not pleasure. If it had the mark of true pleasure, weariness should not arise. Such various marks of pleasure from desire born of causes and conditions are truly unobtainable; when pleasure is lost, then there is suffering. The Buddha said: 'One should contemplate pleasant sensation as suffering; one should contemplate painful sensation as a dart in the flesh; one should contemplate neither-painful-nor-pleasant sensation as arising, perishing, and anitya.' This is called mindfulness of sensation."