Houyhnhnm

“ Texts from a work which taught that there was no God, no Creator, no creation,—nothing but mind, minding itself. It is incredible in how exhausted an atmosphere the divine spark within us will glimmer on, and even warm the dark chambers of the human heart. Comforted by his prayers, Hiouen-thsang proceeded, and arrived after some time at a large lake. He was in the country of the Oïgour Tatars. They received him well, nay, too well. One of the Tatar Khans, himself a Buddhist, sent for the Buddhist pilgrim, and insisted on his staying with him to instruct his people. ”

“ I do not know whether the boy envied me or not, but I wish I could have left that benediction to him, for I took a great liking to him, his shrewd smile, his gay eyes, his promise of a Hebrew nose, and his whole wise little visage. He said that he went to school and studied reading, writing, geography and everything. All the children we spoke to said that they went to school, and they were quick and intelligent. They could mostly speak English, while most of their elders knew only Yiddish. ”

“ For some mysterious reason, surprisingly little attention has been given in the daily papers to a remarkable 'scene' at the Holborn Empire last Thursday, when Houdini made a plucky and public-spirited protest against prevailing matinee methods. We must, we suppose, attribute to the present obsession of politics the scant attention given to a very unusual incident, of interest alike to the public and the profession. ”

“ Henceforth the world has no charms. I will get me a few acres on the banks of the Ying, and there await the end, teaching my son and thy son, if haply they may grow up,—my daughter and thy daughter, until their day of marriage comes. Alas! though words fail, love endureth. Dost thou hear, or dost thou not hear? Woe is me: Heaven bless thee!”
Of all Han Yü’s writings in prose or in verse, there was not one which caused anything like the sensation produced by his memorial to the Emperor on the subject of Buddha’s bone. ”

“ Time and time again Houdini has encountered such perils, and in every case he owes his life and the preservation of his secret to his extraordinary acuteness of perception, to his marvelous knowledge of human nature, to his physical prowess that is far greater than appears from a merely superficial inspection, and, last and greatest of all, to the fact that the majority of people witnessing his wonders attribute a quasi supernatural power. ”

“ If only the mind has no impurity, the Western Land is not far. If the mind gives rise to impurities, even though you invoke the Buddha and seek to be reborn in the West, it will be difficult to reach . . . but if you practice straightforward mind, you will arrive there in an instant.8
Hui-neng also questioned the traditional Ch'an practice of sitting in meditation, declaring it to be more a mind-set than a physical act (if his Sutra is authentic, then he predates his pupil Shen-hui on this point) . He also broke it apart into two different categories: the sitting and the meditation. ”

“ From the past of twelve hundred years ago, we can hear the breaking of that water-skin;— we can feel the voiceless despair that for a moment chilled the heart and faith of Hiouen-thsang,—alone in the desert of skeletons,—alone in the infinite platitude of sand broken only by the mockeries of the mirage. But the might of faith helped him on; prayers were his food, Buddha the star-compass that illuminated the path to India. ”

“ But as it was this was impossible, and I contented myself with a frigid reserve, in which I was joined by the Huguenot. He looked from one to the other of us with a satirical smile on his thin lips, and then rising made a slight bow and left us to ourselves. As we returned to our seats from our response to his greeting, I blurted out the questions:
'Who is M. d'Ayen? Why is he here?'
'Who is he? It is enough to say he is one of those men who live on the follies of kings. ”

“ When his last hour approached, he divided all his property among the poor, invited his friends to come and see him, and take a cheerful farewell of the impure body of Hiouen-thsang. “I desire,” he said, “that whatever merits I may have gained by good works may fall upon other people. May I be born again with them in the heaven of the blessed, be admitted to the family of Mi-le, and serve the Buddha of the future, who is full of kindness and affection. ”

“ At night, Urad was shown a glorious apartment to rest in, and the son of Houadir attended her.
"My dear Houadir," said Urad, "when shall I behold your proper shape? When shall I see you as my tutelary genius?"
"That," answered the son of Houadir, "I shall be in every shape; but call neither one nor the other my proper shape; for to a genius all shapes are assumed: neither is this my proper shape, nor the wrinkles of an old woman. ”

“ As John Wu has pointed out, in a sense Huang-po had come back full circle to the insights of Chuang Tzu: good and evil are meaningless; intuitive knowledge is more profound than speech-bound logic; there is an underlying unity (for Chuang Tzu it was the Tao or Way; for Huang-po, the Universal Mind) that represents the ineffable absolute.30
In effect, Huang-po laid it all out, cleared the way, and defined Ch'an once and for all. The Perennial Philosophy was never more strongly stated. The experimental age of Ch'an thus drew to a close, its job finished. ”

“ Say nothing, and sit still—as if meditating. If you stir, or make any noise, you will be torn asunder. Do not get frightened; and do not think of calling for help—because no help could save you. If you do exactly as I tell you, the danger will pass, and you will have nothing more to fear.”
After dark the priest and the acolyte went away; and Hōïchi seated himself on the verandah, according to the instructions given him. He laid his biwa on the planking beside him, and, assuming the attitude of meditation, remained quite still,—taking care not to cough, or to breathe audibly. ”

“ There was a quarrel between a thin, shrill-voiced, highly dressed, much-bedizened Jewess, on the one side, and a fat, greedy old woman, half asleep, and a boy with large pink transparent ears that stood out from his head like the handles of a jar, on the other side, about a seat which the Hebrew wanted, and which the others had kept filled with packages on the pretense that it was engaged. It was a loud and fierce quarrel enough, but it won no sort of favor ”

“ I could not conceal my surprise at her knowledge.
“You must not banter me, sir,” said she bashfully, “or I shall hold my tongue.”
“Ah Mimili! speak on,” cried I, kissing her hand, which lay within my arm. “I could listen to you for a day together, while you are talking of your Alps.”
“Don’t you think our mountains beautiful?” she again began, in her former friendly tone. “You should stay here always. I fancy I should not like any spot in the whole world as I do our own. It must be very disagreeable to live in a flat country. ”

“ For a Huguenot we knew he must be.
"The Baron de Rosny," he answered; adding with a sneer, "He is a careful man! If they were all like him, with eyes on both sides of his head and a dag by his candle—well, my lord, there would be one more king in France—or one less! But they are a blind lot: as blind as bats." He muttered something farther in which I caught the word "to-night." But I did not hear it all; or understand any of it.
"Your lordships are going to Paris?" he resumed in a different tone. When I said that we were, he looked at me in a shamefaced way, half timid, half arrogant. ”

“ It is touching to see full grown men approach him, call him ‘papa,’ and kiss his hand.” At this time also, he received a letter from Goethe’s friend, Zelter, at Berlin, in which he wished Haydn could hear with what “repose, devotion, purity and reverence,” his choruses were sung at the Sing Akademie. “Your spirit has entered into the sanctuary of divine wisdom. You have brought down fire from heaven, to warm our earthly hearts, and guide us to the Infinite. ”

“ Every one turned towards him, but old Hohannes said hopelessly, "It is no use; yet speak on, Yon Effendi; thou dost ever speak wisely."
"There is one way of saving Shushan."
"Let me speak first," an old man, as old as Hohannes, broke in hastily. "Englishman, thou [Pg 77] hast lived long among us, but thou art not of our race. Thou dost not yet understand that we are born to suffer, and have no defence except patience. ”

“ I suppose I had ventured a step beyond the line, for I cannot recollect exactly what I had done, owing to the powerful effect of the wine I had taken, when she caught hold of both my hands, pressed them to her bosom, and said, in a tone that might have melted the everlasting mountains which towered above us, “Don’t behave so; I am but a weak girl, and you are a strong man, with whom my father has trusted his maiden.” Throwing her left arm round me, she pressed the Iron Cross to her lips with the right, as the superstitious, when in imminent danger, would an amulet. ”

“ I know that you like people to be perfectly truthful. But--I couldn’t--without seeming to--brag.”
“I understand,” said Miss Hernshaw.
“I took the risk of your writing to St. John; but then I realized that if he answered and told you what I ought to have told you myself, it would make it worse, and I came back.”
“I don’t know whether it would have made it worse; but you have come too late,” said Miss Hernshaw. “I’ve just written to Mr. St. John.”
They were both silent for what Hewson thought a long time. ”

“ Old French has the name inflected as Hue, Hues, Huon, and the feminine Huette; and the true Anglicized Welsh form is Hu or Hew, though it is now universally confounded with the Teutonic Hugh, from hugur, thought, with which it may be cognate, and the Welsh patronymic Ap Hu is always spelt Pugh.
The Triads speak of Aed Mawr, or Aedd, as father of Pridain, but he may have been either a title of Hu, or else the god himself. Aodh is, in fact, in sound and sense, closely related to the Greek αίθω (aitho) , and our heat is of the same kin. ”

“ Then he was seized as you saw, and in his terror forgot all about the seal, as did the King and his officers.”
“But, surely, Bes, those who took Houman to the boat would have removed it.”
“Master, even the most clear-sighted do not see well at night. At any rate my hope was that they had not done so, and that is why I waded out to prick the eyes of Houman. Moreover, as I had hoped, so it was; there beneath his robe I saw the chain. ”

“ Generally speaking, the Buddhist gods had that placid expression which becomes revealers, who teach that man must, through infinite transmigrations, continue the annihilation of his own personality; and the Houanins seated in the calyx of the lotus, the symbol of festivity, eloquently represented the saints of that material religion—their faces, devoid of expression, seemed to say that woman in this life is but the passive agent of eternal regeneration. ”

“ The people who pushed upward to seize the great hand held out to every one looked mostly like the country folk such as he had been of, and the best of him always was, and I could hear their hoarse or cracked voices as they hailed him, oftenest in affectionate joking, sometimes in fervent blessing; but for anything I could make out he answered nothing. He stood passive, submissive, with the harsh lines of his lower face set immovably, and his thick-lashed eyes sad above them, while he took the hands held up to him one after another, and shook them wearily, wearily. ”

“ The sidewalks and the roadways were thronged with peddlers and purchasers, and everywhere I saw splendid types of that old Hebrew world which had the sense if not the knowledge of God when all the rest of us lay sunk in heathen darkness. There were women with oval faces and olive tints, and clear, dark eyes, relucent as evening pools, and men with long beards of jetty black or silvery white, and the noble profiles of their race. ”

“ Hui-k'o insists that all things spring from the one Mind, and consequently the ideas of duality, of attachment to this or that phenomenon, or even the possibility of choice, are equally absurd. Although he knew all too well that enlightenment could not be obtained from teaching, he still did not advocate a radical break with the traditional methods of the Buddhist dhyana masters. His style was unorthodox, but his teaching methods were still confined to lectures and meditation. ”

“ Here Houman threw himself upon his face in terror and began to babble out I know not what about the punishment of the boat, which was unlucky for him, for it put the matter into the King’s mind.
“The boat!” he cried. “Ah! yes, the boat; being so fat you will fit it well, Eunuch. To the boat with him, and before he enters it a hundred blows upon the feet with the rods,” and he pointed at him with his sceptre.
Then guards sprang upon Houman and dragged him away. As he went he clutched at Bes, but hissing something into his ear, the dwarf bit him through the hand till he let go. ”

“ But in the lapse of a thousand years and more the Lotus Flower of the Good Law had lost its perfume; much of the wisdom of the World-honored had been forgotten; fire and the fury of persecution had made small the number of holy books. When Hiouen-thsang sought for the deeper wisdom of the Law he found it not; nor was there in all China one who could inform him. Then a great longing came upon him to go to India, the land of the Savior of Man, and there seek the wondrous words that had been lost, and the marvelous books unread by Chinese eyes. ”

“ You know that we give seances here, showing the phenomena of materialization. These are not spirit studies. They are scientific.
“It would interest Mr. Feilding and ourselves to have at our seances a master in the art of prestidigitation, but I have always refused to admit to my house, an ordinary prestidigitator, or even one of better rank. Our work is serious and real, and the gift of Mlle. Eva might disappear forever, if some awkward individual insists on thinking there is fraud involved, instead of real and interesting facts, which especially interest the scientific. ”