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Cold Mountain

A Buddhist monk named Han Shan got tired of life in the monastery and moved off to the wilderness. He wrote verses on rocks and trees to express his thoughts about life – these were collected and assembled in a text called Cold Mountain.

 

The clear water sparkles like crystal,
you can see through it easily, right to the bottom.
My mind is free from every thought,
nothing in the myriad realms can move it.

Since it cannot be wantonly roused,
forever and forever it will stay unchanged.
When you have learned to know in this way,
you’ll know there is no inside or out.

 

Talking about food won’t make you full,
babbling of clothes won’t keep out the cold.
A bowl of rice is what fills the belly;
it takes a suit of clothing to make you warm.

And yet, without stopping to consider this,
you complain that Buddha is hard to find.
Turn your mind within! There he is!
Why look for him outside?

 

High, high from the summit of the peak,
whatever way I look, no limit in sight!
No one knows I am sitting here alone.
A solitary moon shines in the cold spring.

Here in the spring – this is not the moon.
The moon is where it always is – in the sky above.
And though I sing this one little song,
in the song there is no Zen.

 

Have I a body or have I none?
Am I who I am or am I not?
Pondering these questions,
I sit leaning against the cliff while the years go by,

till the green grass grows between my feet
and the red dust settles on my head,
and the men of the world, thinking me dead,
come with offerings of wine and fruit to lay by my corpse.

 

Yes, there are stingy people,
but I’m not one of the stingy kind.
The robe I wear is flimsy? The better to dance in.
Wine gone? It went with a toast and a song.

Just so you keep your belly full –
never let those two legs go weary.
When the weeds are poking through your skull,
That’s the day you’ll have regrets!

 

Today I sat before the cliff,
sat a long time till mists had cleared.
A single thread, the clear stream runs cold;
a thousand yards the green peaks lift their heads.

White clouds – the morning light is still.
Moonrise – the lamp of night drifts upward.
Body free from dust and stain,
What cares could trouble my mind?

 

An Essay on Beauty – Plotinus

In our search for Beauty, Plotinus starts at the lowest level of life: in this material world perceived by our material senses. Then we begin to explore the mechanism or processes by which we judge things to be beautiful, whether heard, spoken or perceived by sight.

When we have amassed enough criteria to ascertain beauty in the physical world, we turn to see if this process will also serve us when we seek to perceive beauty in our internal world. The idea of beauty in our inner world may seem novel and full of unknowns as we face a wilderness largely unexplored. Perhaps the reader did not realize there was beauty worth pursuing in the mental or spiritual world – until they return to the mundanity of this material world.

For there is a soul residing in each of us and in its infancy it resembles the ugly-duckling. It will not grow into a beautiful swan on its own – we must purify our inner world by leading a life of virtue. For virtues “are certain purgatives of the soul; and hence the sacred mysteries prophecy obscurely, yet with truth, that the soul not purified lies in Tartarus, immersed in filth.”

In pursuing this refinement of the soul we may see ourselves and others in a new way. If we are fortunate to know a great soul we may admire their manner, temperance and fortitude.  “For what else is true temperance than not to indulge in corporeal delights, but to fly from their connection, as things which are neither pure, nor the offspring of purity? And true fortitude is not to fear death; for death is nothing more than a certain separation of soul from body, and this he will not fear, who desires to be alone.”

So we are shown a method or philosophy to purify our inner world in order to a realize the beauty that lies latent within. Like a sculptor, we chisel away at the useless until we are left with a beautiful swan, the ancient symbol of the soul.

 

 

 

“Magnanimity is the contempt of every mortal concern; it is the wing by which we fly into the regions of intellect? Thus we are lead to the last, • that” prudence is no other than intelligence, declining
subordinate objects-, and directing the eye of the soul To that which is immortal and divine.” And so the reader is led to realms of bear.”  er e fo fore un imagined. But isn’t this an excellent outcome of reading, to discover something new about-ourselves and our latent potential. Became Be sure to read the excellent interdiction by Thomas Taylor, who goes to great lengths To prepare the modern reader for an ancient text, written for a different audience, addressing a philosophy more peculiar to their times than ours.

Emily Dickinson

Much Madness is divinest Sense –
To a discerning Eye –
Much Sense – the starkest Madness –

‘Tis the Majority
In this, as All, prevail –

Assent – and you are sane –
Demur – you’re straightway dangerous –
And handled with a Chain –

 

I’m Nobody! Who are you?
Are you – Nobody – Too?
Then there’s a pair of us?
Don’t tell! they’d advertise – you know!

How dreary – to be – Somebody!
How public – like a Frog –
To tell one’s name – the livelong June –
To an admiring Bog!

 

Some keep the Sabbath going to Church –
I keep it, staying at Home –
With a Bobolink for a Chorister –
And an Orchard, for a Dome –

Some keep the Sabbath in Surplice –
I, just wear my Wings –
And instead of tolling the Bell, for Church,
Our little Sexton – sings.

God preaches, a noted Clergyman –
And the sermon is never long,
So instead of getting to Heaven, at last –
I’m going, all along.

Francis Bacon

With a gentleman I am always a gentleman and a half, and with a fraud I try to be a fraud and a half.

Who questions much, shall learn much, and retain much.

Read not to contradict and confute, nor to believe and take for granted… but to weigh and consider.

Science is but an image of the truth.

Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed.

It is in life as it is in ways, the shortest way is commonly the foulest, and surely the fairer way is not much about.

Confucius

Wherever you go, go with all your heart.

When anger rises, think of the consequences.

What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to others.

The superior man thinks always of virtue; the common man thinks of comfort.

The superior man is distressed by the limitations of his ability; he is not distressed by the fact that men do not recognize the ability that he has.

The superior man acts before he speaks, and afterwards speaks according to his action.

The strength of a nation derives from the integrity of the home.

The more man meditates upon good thoughts, the better will be his world and the world at large.

Real knowledge is to know the extent of one’s ignorance.

It is more shameful to distrust our friends than to be deceived by them.

He who speaks without modesty will find it difficult to make his words good.

Better a diamond with a flaw than a pebble without.

A superior man is modest in his speech, but exceeds in his actions.

Mingle not in projects with men whose ways are not yours.

When love is at stake, yield not to an army.

The whole end of speech is to be understood.

It is humans that make truth great, not truth that makes humans great.

Your goody-goody people are the thieves of virtue.

Having heard the True Way in the morning, what matters it if one should come to die that night?

The nobler sort of man is proficient in the knowledge of his duty; the inferior man is proficient only in money-making.

Few are those who err on the side of self-restraint.

He who requires much from himself and little from others will be secure from hatred.

To be wronged is nothing unless you continue to remember it.

I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand.

Study without thought is vain; thought without study is perilous.

If language is lucid, that is enough.

The wise man will be slow to speak but quick to act.

Voltaire

The secret of being a bore is to tell everything.

Doubt is not a pleasant condition, but certainty is an absurd one.

Love truth, but pardon error.

I detest what you write, but I would give my life to make it possible for you to continue to write.

If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him.

There are truths which are not for all men, nor for all times.

I cannot imagine how the clockwork of the universe can exist without a clockmaker.

Better is the enemy of good.

Don’t think money does everything or you are going to end up doing everything for money.

Prejudices are what fools use for reason.

Anyone who has the power to make you believe absurdities has the power to make you commit injustices.

Everything you say should be true, but not everything true should be said.

To hold a pen is to be at war.

Every man is guilty of all the good he did not do.

‎Life is a shipwreck, but we must not forget to sing in the lifeboats.

Is there anyone so wise as to learn by the experience of others?

Judge a man by his questions rather than by his answers.

The most important decision you make is to be in a good mood.

No problem can withstand the assault of sustained thinking.

The more I read, the more I acquire, the more certain I am that I know nothing.

You have no control over the hand that life deals you, but how you play that hand is entirely up to you.

Give me the patience for the small things of life, courage for the great trials of life. Help me to do my best each day and then go to sleep knowing God is awake.

To succeed in the world it is not enough to be stupid—one must also be polite.

Liberty of thought is the life of the soul.

The comfort of the rich depends upon an abundant supply of the poor.

The more often a stupidity is repeated, the more it gets the appearance of wisdom.

Present opportunities are not to be neglected; they rarely visit us twice.

Dare to think for yourself.

Wherever my travels may lead, paradise is where I am.

We never live; we are always in the expectation of living.

All the reasonings of men are not worth one sentiment of women.