Page:A history of Chinese literature - Giles.djvu/127

 " He cannot, O World-Honoured, and for this reason : The Buddha has declared that flesh has no objective existence.

"Then Buddha told Subhuti, saying, All objective existences are unsubstantial and unreal. If a man can see clearly that they are so, then can he see the Buddha."

(2.) " Buddha said, O Subhuti, if one man were to col- lect the seven precious things from countless galaxies of worlds, and bestow all these in charity, and another virtuous man, or virtuous woman, were to become filled with the spirit, and held fast by this sdtra, preach- ing it ever so little for the conversion of mankind, I say unto you that the happiness of this last man would far exceed the happiness of that other man.

" Conversion to what ? To the disregard of objective existences, and to absolute quiescence of the individual. And why ? Because every external phenomenon is like a dream, like a vision, like a bubble, like shadow, like dew, like lightning, and should be regarded as such."

In A.D. 520 Bodhidharma came to China, and was received with honour. He had been the son of a king in Southern India. He taught that religion was not to be learnt from books, but that man should seek and find the Buddha in his own heart. Just before his arrival Sung Yiin had been sent to India to obtain more Buddhist books, and had remained two years in Kandahar, returning with 175 volumes.

Then, in 629, HSUAN TSANG set out for India with the same object, and also to visit the holy places of Buddhism. He came back in 645, bringing with him 657 Buddhist books, besides many images and pictures

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