841Uif

LETTER TO THE LAYMAN IPPO I 177extending over innumerable years past is instantly annihilated, likesnow put into a roaring furnace. No thought of Buddha or Truthremains. How, then, can any mind illness persist? Why can't thekarmically begotten delusions and the manifold discriminativethoughts and notions of the unenlightened mind be quelled? Simplybecause true Self-realization has not taken place. You can no morestop yourself from being driven within the Six Realms of ceaselesschange without [fl.rst] realizing your Self-nature than you can stopwater from boiling without quenching the ftre beneath it.Fortunately, you believe there is a truth specially transmitted outsidethe scriptures and scholastic teachings. Then why bother aboutthe meaning of these scriptures? Renounce fo rthwith all such reflectionsand see the master directly. What is the master who at this verymoment is seeing and hearing? If you reply, as most do, that it is Mindor Nature or Buddha or one's Face before birth or one's OriginalHome or Koan or Being or Nothingness or Emptiness or Form-and­Color or the Known or the Unknown or Truth or Delusion, or saysomething or remain silent, or regard it as Enlightenment or Ignorance,you fall into error at once. What is more, if you are so foolhardyas to doubt the reality of this master, you bind yourself thoughyou use no rope. However much you try to know it through logicalreasoning or to name or call it, you are doomed to failure. And eventhough all of you becomes one mass of questioning as you turn inwardand intently search the very core of your being, you will fl.ndnothing that can be termed Mind or Essence. Yet should someonecall your name, something from within will hear and respond. Findout this instant who it is !If you push forward with your last ounce of strength at the verypoint where the path of your thinking has been blocked, and then,completely stymied, leap with hands high in the air into the tremendousabyss of flre confronting you-into the ever-burning flame ofyour own primordial nature-all ego-consciousness, all delusivefeelings and thoughts and perceptions will perish with your ego-rootand the true source of your Self-nature will appear. You will feelresurrected, all sickness having completely vanished, and will experiencegenuine peace and joy. You will be entirely free. For thefirst time you will realize that walking on water is like walking onground and walking on ground like walking on water; that all day