As a tree with strong uninjured roots, though cut down, grows up again, so, when deep craving is not rooted out, suffering arises again and again.

- Dhammapada

Now there is cure in coolness and calm, but in heat and passion there can be no cure.

- Milindapanha

What is "not thus"? It is your self. What is "thus"? It is the Buddhas.

- Dogen, "Rational Zen"

Subhuti asked: "How can the practitioner who wishes to help all beings find enlightenment awaken to the complete and perfect wisdom?" The Buddha said: "This most subtle awakening comes about through moment-to-moment attentiveness. By way of attentiveness, there is attunement to the ways in which things manifest, such as form and consciousness. The practitioner awakens to perfect wisdom by becoming blissfully free from obsessions with habits, names, sense experiences, personal feelings, and with dread of dying and all the despair that goes with it."


Anyone who, even for a second, feels a pure, clear confidence on hearing the truth will experience immeasurable happiness. Why? Because, at that moment, that person is not caught up in the concept of a self or a living being or a life span. He is not caught up in concepts about the world, nor is he caught up in concepts about nothingness. He does not take any notice of the idea that this is a sign, or this or that is not a sign. For if you are caught up in ideas, then you will be caught up in the self. And even if you are caught up in ideas about nothingness, you will still be caught up in the self. That's why we should not get attached to the belief that things either exist or do not exist. This is the hidden meaning when I say that my teachings are a raft to be abandoned when you see true being.

- Diamond Sutra

Just as the word chariot is merely a means of expressing how axle, body, wheel, and poles are brought together in a certain relationship, but when we look at each of them one by one there is no chariot in an absolute sense; and just as the word house is a way of expressing how wood and other materials stand in relationship to each other in a certain space, but in the absolute sense there is no house; and just as the word fist is an expression for the finger and thumb in relationship, and tree for trunk, branches, leaves, and so on, but in an absolute sense there is no fist or tree--in exactly the same way the words living entity and person are but ways of expressing the relationship of body, feeling, and consciousness, but when we come to examine the elements of being, one by one, we find there is no entity there. In the absolute sense there is only name and form and the mystery which they express. Such ideas as "I" and "I am" are not absolute.

- Visuddhi Magga


- Prajnaparamita