..续本文上一页Those of us who have some intelligence should be capable of investigating and examining things and coming to know their true nature. Each thing we come across we must study, in order to understand clearly its true nature. And we must understand the nature and the source of the suffering which produces, and which sets us alight and scorches us. To establish mindfulness, to watch and wait, to examine in the manner described the suffering that comes to one-- this is very best way to penetrate to Buddha-Dhamma. It is infinitely better than learning it from the Tipitaka. Busily studying Dhamma in the Tipitaka from the linguistic or literary viewpoint is no way to come to know the true nature of things. Of course the Tipitaka is full of explanations as to the nature of things; but the trouble is that people listen to it in the manner of parrots or talking myna birds, repeating later what they have been able to memorize. They themselves are incapable of penetrating to the true nature of things. If instead they would do some introspection and discover for themselves the facts of mental life, find out firsthand the properties of the mental defilements, of suffering, of nature, in other words of all the things in which they are involved, they would then be able to penetrate to the real Buddha- Dhamma. Though a person may never have seen or even heard of the Tipitaka, if he carries out detailed investigation every time suffering arises and scorches his mind he can be said to be studying the Tipitaka directly, and far more correctly than people actually in the process of reading it. These may be just caressing the books of the Tipitaka everyday without having any knowledge of the immortal Dhamma, the teaching contained within them. Likewise, we have ourselves, we make use of ourselves, we train ourselves, and we do things connected with ourselves every day, without knowing anything about ourselves, without being able to handle adequately problems concerning ourselves. We are still very definitely subject to suffering, and craving is still present to produce more and more suffering every day as we grow older, all simply because we don”t know ourselves. We still don”t know the mental life we live. To get to know the Tipitaka and the profound things hidden within it is most difficult. Let us rather set about studying Buddha-Dhamma by getting to know our own true nature. Let us get to know all the things which make up this very body and mind. Let us learn from this life: life which is spinning on in the cycle of desiring, acting on the desires, and reaping the results of the action, which then nourish the will to desire again, and so on, over and over incessantly; life which is obliged to go spinning on in the circle of samsara, that sea of suffering, purely and simply because of ignorance as to the true nature of things or what is what.

　　Summing up, Buddhism is an organized practical system designed to reveal to us the "what is what." Once we have seen things as they really are, we no longer need anyone to teach or guide us. We can carry on practising by ourselves. One progresses along the Aryian Path just as rapidly as one eliminates the defilements and gives up inappropriate action. Ultimately one will attain to the best thing possible for a human being, what we call the Fruit of the Path, Nirvana. This one can do by oneself simply by means of coming to know the ultimate sense of the "what is what."

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