each day, this light flows and whirls, stopping who knows where. If you can
sit quietly for a while, all time—ten thousand ages, a thousand lifetimes—is
penetrated from this. All phenomena revert to stillness. Truly inconceivable
is this sublime truth.
12. Nevertheless, the actual practice goes from shallow to deep, from crude
to fine. Throughout, it is best to be consistent. The practice is one from
beginning to end, but its quality during the process can be known only by
oneself Nevertheless, it is necessary to wind up at the point where "heaven
is open, earth is broad, and all things are just as they are" for only this can
be considered attainment.
13. What has been communicated through successive sages is not beyond
reversed gazing. Confucians call it "reaching toward knowledge" Buddhists
call it "observing mind" Taoists call it "inner observation."
14. The essential teaching is summarized above; as for the rest, matters of
entering and exiting stillness, the prelude and the aftermath, one should use
the book Small Stopping and Seeing for a touchstone.
15. The words focus on the center are most sublime. The center is
omnipresent; the whole universe is within it. This indicates the mechanism
of Creation; you focus on this to enter the gate, that is all. To focus means to
focus on this as a hint, not to become rigidly fixated. The meaning of the
word focus has life to it; it is very subtle.
