But now, tracing life to its origin according to the highest doctrine, we have fully understood that we ourselves were originally Buddhas.  Therefore we should act in conformity to Buddha’s (action), and keep our mind in harmony with his.  Lot us betake ourselves once more to the source of Enlightened Spirit, restoring ourselves to the original Buddhahood.  Let us cut off the bond of attachment, and remove the illusion that common people are habitually given to.

Illusion being destroyed,[FN#387] the will to destroy it is also removed, and at last there remains nothing to be done (except complete peace and joy).  This naturally results in Enlightenment, whose practical uses are as innumerable as the grains of sand in the Ganges.  This state is called Buddhahood.  We should know that the illusory as well as the Enlightened are originally of one and the same Real Spirit.  How great, how excellent, is the doctrine that traces man to such an origin![FN#388]

[FN#387] The passage occurs in Tao Teh King.

[FN#388] A.  ’Although all of the above-mentioned five doctrines were preached by the Buddha Himself, yet there are some that belong to the Sudden, while others to the Gradual, Teachings.  If there were persons of the middle or the lowest grade of understanding, He first taught the most superficial doctrine, then the less superficial, and “Gradually” led them up to the profound.  At the outset of His career as a teacher He preached the first doctrine to enable them to give up evil and abide by good; next He preached the second and the third doctrine that they might remove the Pollution and attain to the Purity; and, lastly, He preached the fourth and the fifth doctrine to destroy their attachment to unreal forms, and to show the Ultimate Reality. (Thus) He reduced (all) the temporary doctrines into the eternal one, and taught them how to practise the Law according to the eternal and attain to Buddhahood.

’If there is a person of the highest grade of understanding, he may first of all learn the most profound, next the less profound, and, lastly, the most superficial doctrine-that is, he may at the outset come “Suddenly” to the understanding of the One Reality of True Spirit, as it is taught in the fifth doctrine.  When the Spiritual Reality is disclosed before his mind’s eye, he may naturally see that it originally transcends all appearances which are unreal, and that unrealities appear on account of illusion, their existence depending on Reality.  Then he must give up evil, practise good, put away unrealities by the wisdom of Enlightenment, and reduce them to Reality.  When unrealities are all gone, and Reality alone remains complete, he is called the Dharma-kaya-Buddha.’

CHAPTER IV

Reconciliation of the temporary with the real doctrine[FN#389]