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率真進修錄

A Record of Sincere Cultivation
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率真進修錄

A Record of Sincere Cultivation
依原稿電子化 · Digitized from the source text
AI 譯稿 · AI translation英文為 AI 初譯，尚未經前賢校訂，仍在持續修訂；僅供對照參考，正文請以中文為準。This English is an AI-assisted draft — not yet reviewed by the senior teachers, and revised over time. Offered for reference alongside the Chinese, which remains authoritative.

引言

Foreword

這本書是一次最上乘講義的記錄。因講率真進修，原來修真道必須切具真心，所講皆為吾人循序前行的階梯，是以取其名曰「率真進修錄」。但此書語白浅粗，文詞俚俗，恐難飽學問淵博、工於藻績者之耳目，可是現世不同，一般世人講的、說的、寫字、作的，無非白話文字，易於瞭解，若拘泥古典，亦恐難以普行。況三期末運，天道普傳，諸佛諸祖倒裝救世，也是因時設教，凡所言及記錄著作，力求其通俗普通，使人一聽即知，一見即明，期收事半功倍之效。所以筆者根據此意，亦如此記載耳，但請觀者諸君，應獨具慧眼，虛心參閱，其言近旨遠，內蘊真理，實在無窮，決非泛常書冊之所可比擬。所謂「上乘大法」何莫非斯，書中題目，皆係院長對眾現身說法，闡演真道之真義。惜乎筆者識淺才短，記錄之時，遺忘頗多，難免掛一漏萬。惟冀觀者諸君，對此書但作一提綱挈領因而得識本來面目，把真理悟穿，早去行功立德，也就算了。區區鄙言，不足一瞥，尚希高明，原諒是幸！

This book is the record of a series of teachings of the very highest order. Its subject is sincere cultivation — for to cultivate the true Dao, one must first of all hold a genuine heart — and all that it sets forth is a stairway for our step-by-step advance. Hence its name: A Record of Sincere Cultivation. The language of this book is plain and unpolished, its diction homely; it may not suit the taste of the deeply learned, or of those skilled in elegant phrasing. But the present age is different. What ordinary people speak and write is simply the plain vernacular, easy to understand; to cling to the classical style would only make these teachings harder to spread. All the more so now, in the End Times of the Third Period, when the Heavenly Way is transmitted far and wide, and the buddhas and patriarchs descend in mortal form to save the world — for this teaching, too, is suited to its time. Everything spoken here, and set down in writing, strives to be plain and clear, so that one hears it and at once knows, sees it and at once understands — gaining a double result for half the effort. It is on this principle that the recorder has written. Yet let the reader bring a discerning eye, and study these pages with an open and humble heart. Their words lie near, but their meaning reaches far; the truth within is inexhaustible, not to be compared with any ordinary book. What is called “the Great Method of the Highest Vehicle” — what is it, if not this? Every topic here is the Director’s own teaching, delivered to the assembly in person, unfolding the true meaning of the true Dao. Regrettably, the recorder is shallow in learning and slight in talent, and in the writing much was forgotten; inevitably, in catching one point, ten thousand slip away. My one hope is that the reader take this book as a bare outline, and through it recognize the Original Face, see through to the truth, and set out early to accrue merit and establish virtue. That alone would be enough. These few humble words are scarcely worth a glance; I can only hope the wise and discerning will forgive them.

目次

Contents
一

如何對上帝正信與釋疑

Right Faith in the Lord on High, and the Resolving of Doubts
掃描 第 4 頁 ↗

古今中外，男女老幼，皆有「上帝」、「天父」、「我主」、「老天爺」等等之尊稱與崇拜。可是這種稱呼與崇拜，其意義究為何在？固然稱呼是個代名詞，然實際考察，確乃無形無象，至尊至貴，至清至虛，至中至正的一點真理。不過此理無聲無臭，空乃非空。詩云：「神之格思，不可度思，矧可射思？」可知祂的微妙莫測，不可思議言談。但祂生育天地，曲成萬物，主宰宇宙，包羅萬象，更顯其至無可以生至有，至虛可以生至實，無為而有為，真空之妙有也。

In every age and every land, among men and women, old and young alike, we meet the reverent names and the worship of ‘the Lord on High,’ ‘the Heavenly Father,’ ‘our Lord,’ ‘the Lord of Heaven,’ and the like. Yet what, after all, do such names and such worship mean? A name, of course, is only a designation. But when we examine the reality, it is truly a single point of Truth — formless and imageless, utterly honored and utterly precious, utterly pure and utterly void, utterly centered and utterly upright. This principle has neither sound nor scent, and its emptiness is yet not emptiness. The Book of Songs says: ‘The coming of the spirits — it cannot be fathomed; how much less may one be negligent in reverence!’1 From this we may know that the Lord on High is subtle beyond all measuring, past all thought and speech. And yet the Lord gives birth to Heaven and Earth, brings all things to completion, governs the universe, and encompasses the myriad forms. This shows all the more how the utterly-nothing can give rise to the utterly-existent, and the utterly-void to the utterly-real — acting without acting, the wondrous being of true emptiness.

如此講說好像很抽象，我們再作進一步研究！據科學家說，認為人類的進化、世界的生成，是一種自然原理。可是，此理究竟是誰主持呢？恐怕人做不到吧！人既不能做到，那麼必定是一個至高至明的神吧！請看天空日月星辰輪流轉移，按時就序，春夏秋冬，寒來暑往；再看大地的山川、湖海泉源，有宗脈之相連。飛潛動植，生殺予奪，若無至高、至大、至剛、至柔的神明主持，還有誰能勝其任呢？

Put this way, it may sound very abstract, so let us look into it a step further. Scientists hold that the evolution of humankind and the forming of the world are a kind of natural principle. But this principle — who, in the end, presides over it? Surely no human could. And if no human can, then it must be some supremely high, supremely luminous divine power. Consider the sky: the sun, moon, and stars revolve in their turns, each keeping to its season and its order; spring gives way to summer, autumn to winter, cold comes and heat departs. Consider the earth: its mountains and rivers, its lakes, seas, and springs, all joined together as by a single lineage of veins. Things that fly and things that swim, things that move and things that grow, granted life or dealt death, given or taken away — were there no divine power, supremely high and great, supremely firm and yielding, presiding over it all, who else could be equal to the task?

再按人的生成來說，我們是父母生的，父母是祖父母生的。推而至於曾祖、高祖，以至祖宗的始祖，究竟是誰生的？科學家進化論上說，人是上古時大馬猴演變的。假使上古時馬猴能夠變上人，為什麼現在的馬猴，就不能變人呢？當真上古時馬猴能夠變人，若演變幾千年，人又不知變什麼東西？人之遺傳各有天性。俗語說，人至困難危險恐急時要叫「天啊」、「娘啊」。由此觀之，人是由天而生。科學是無稽之談了。現在科學雖然萬能，亦不過借金屬品質、化學元素，配合成種種機器。但任何貴重質料，要想造個萬靈的人，恐怕決無其事。

Consider, again, how human beings come to be. We are born of our parents; our parents were born of theirs; and tracing back through great-grandfathers and high ancestors, to the very first ancestor of all — who, in the end, gave birth to that one? The scientists’ theory of evolution says that humans evolved from the great apes of remote antiquity. But if apes in ancient times could change into humans, why can today’s apes not change into humans? And if apes truly could become humans long ago, then after a few thousand more years of evolving, who knows what humans themselves will turn into? Human heredity carries in each of us an inborn nature. As the common saying has it, when a person is in the utmost difficulty, danger, or fright, he cries out ‘O Heaven!’ and ‘O Mother!’ Seen in this light, humankind is born of Heaven, and the scientific account is idle talk. Science today may be all but omnipotent, yet it does no more than borrow metals and chemical elements and fit them together into machines of every kind. But to take any precious material and try to fashion from it a living, spirit-endowed human being — that, I fear, can never be done.

吾們是由天而生，上帝是吾們的始祖。所以俗語云：我們都是老天爺的兒子。聖經上說過：「人不是血氣生的，不是情慾生的，不是人意生的。乃是從神生的。」道祖亦曾說過：「無極生太極，太極生兩儀，兩儀生四象，四象生八卦。」又云：「一生二，二生三，三生萬物。」儒云：「上天之載，無聲無臭。」又曰：「參贊化育」。耶穌說：「上帝是吾們的天父。」以上諸般說法，都是證明我們的色身靈性，和萬物構造的由來，確係上帝所生，毫無疑義。現在吾們既然曉得上帝對吾們有如此罔極之恩，我們必須拿出真心，抱定恒志，息異端，拒詖行，清理自己身心，純正自己念頭。體貼天慈，報答天恩，這才是對上帝正信與釋疑了。

We are born of Heaven, and the Lord on High is our first ancestor. Hence the common saying: we are all children of the Lord of Heaven. Scripture says: ‘born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.’2 The Patriarch of the Dao, too, once said: ‘The Limitless gives rise to the Supreme Ultimate; the Supreme Ultimate to the Two Modes; the Two Modes to the Four Emblems; the Four Emblems to the Eight Trigrams.’3 And again: ‘One gives birth to Two, Two to Three, and Three to the ten-thousand things.’4 The Confucians say: ‘The workings of High Heaven have neither sound nor scent’;5 and that man is to ‘assist the transforming and nourishing of Heaven and Earth.’6 Jesus said: ‘God is our Father in heaven.’7 All these sayings prove, beyond any doubt, that our bodily form and spiritual nature, and the making of all things, truly issue from the Lord on High. And now that we know the Lord on High has shown us grace so boundless, we must bring forth a genuine heart and hold fast to a steadfast resolve — putting a stop to heterodoxy, refusing all crooked conduct, cleansing our own body and mind, and making pure our every thought. To cherish Heaven’s tenderness and repay Heaven’s grace: this, at last, is what it means to hold right faith in the Lord on High and to resolve one’s doubts.
二

將自身信任了嗎

Have You Come to Trust in Your Own Self?
掃描 第 6 頁 ↗

這一題，就是問吾們個人，將自己的由來與任務，明白了沒有？相信了沒有？吾們的身，固然是父精母血生育的，可是父母只能生肉體。必得上帝賦給靈性，才能算個完全人。但是人之一生，適如住旅舘，一宿就走。旅舘內設備之物，一點也帶不走。你要偷拿人家一點東西，必定落個盜賊之名。

This topic asks each of us, personally: have you understood your own origin and your own task — and have you come to believe in them? Our body, to be sure, is begotten of a father’s seed and a mother’s blood; yet our parents can give birth only to the flesh. Only when the Lord on High bestows the spiritual nature is one reckoned a complete human being. A person’s whole life is like lodging at an inn: one stays a single night and moves on, and of all the furnishings within, not a single thing can be carried away. Steal so much as a trifle that belongs to another, and you are sure to be branded a thief.

我們既知靈性是上帝所生，由先天而來。可知和 上帝分別時，一定也是有任務，奉 差遣而來的。但任務是什麼呢？就是代天宣化，治理世界。然而一落後天，就被酒色財氣埋沒了。以致背覺合塵，愈趨愈迷，造下無量罪孽，流浪生死，冤緣相報，釀成了空前未有浩劫。因上天慈悲無量，尤恐吾們墜入劫凶，所以不惜密寶，真道降世，使吾們得道、修道、了道、成道。眼前可以躲脫末劫之苦，死後可以永享無極之樂。可是我們既是 老所生，道亦是 老所降，得此無量宏恩，怎在 前盡孝？惟有體貼 心，竭盡己力，到各處開荒下種，己立立人，己達達人，使九六同胞齊出苦海，共登覺路，同朝 顏，方算達到任務。

Since we know that the spiritual nature is born of the Lord on High and comes to us from the primordial, we may also know that, when we parted from the Lord on High, we surely came bearing a task — sent forth on a divine commission. And what is that task? It is to proclaim Heaven’s transforming teaching in its stead, and to bring order to the world. Yet once fallen into this latter world, we were buried under wine, sex, wealth, and temper. Turning from awakening to embrace the dust, we strayed ever deeper into delusion — piling up measureless sins, drifting through birth and death, grievance-bonds requiting one another, and so brewing a catastrophe without precedent. High Heaven, boundless in mercy, feared above all that we should sink into the horrors of this final calamity. And so it did not begrudge the secret treasure, but sent the true Dao down into the world — that we might attain the Dao, cultivate it, complete it, and perfect it; in this present life escaping the bitterness of the last catastrophe, and after death forever enjoying the bliss of the Limitless. But since we are born of the Eternal Mother, and the Dao too descends from the Eternal Mother, then — having received grace so measureless and vast — how are we to fulfill our filial duty before the Eternal Mother? Only by tenderly heeding the Eternal Mother’s heart and spending our every strength: going out to every place to break new ground and sow the seed, establishing ourselves and thereby establishing others, bringing ourselves through and thereby bringing others through. In this way all our brethren — the ninety-six hundred million souls — may together escape the sea of suffering, together ascend the road of awakening, and together come before the Eternal Mother’s countenance. Only then may the task be counted fulfilled.

總之，凡站在個人崗位上，不做非禮犯法之事，常能行端品正，無愧於天者，可謂信任了自身。

In sum: whoever stands firm at his own post, doing nothing contrary to propriety or the law, but conducting himself always uprightly and correctly, with nothing to be ashamed of before Heaven — such a one may be said to have come to trust in his own self.
三

道與人生之關係

The Dao and Its Bearing on Human Life
掃描 第 7 頁 ↗

道即理，理即路。萬事萬物由道而生，故萬事萬物，亦各具其理：天有天理，地有地理，人有性理。

The Dao is Principle, and Principle is the road. The ten-thousand affairs and things are born of the Dao, and so each of them possesses its own principle as well: Heaven has the principle of Heaven, Earth the principle of Earth, and man the principle of his nature.

天失理則星斗亂度；地失理則山崩川溢；人失理則倫常乖舛。故常諺有曰：「有理走遍天下，無理寸步難行。」由此觀之，道與人生之關係，至為密切。

When Heaven loses its principle, the stars fall out of their courses; when Earth loses its principle, mountains crumble and rivers overflow; when man loses his principle, the bonds of human relation fall into disorder. Hence the common proverb: ‘With principle on your side you may walk the whole world over; without it you can scarcely move a single step.’ Seen in this light, the bearing of the Dao upon human life is close indeed.

孔子云：「誰能出不由戶，何莫由斯道也？」孟子云：「天下溺，援之以道。」子思云：「道也者，不可須臾離也！可離，非道也！」

Confucius said: ‘Who can go out except by the door? Why, then, will none walk by this Dao?’1 Mencius said: ‘When the world is drowning, one rescues it with the Dao.’2 And Zisi said: ‘The Dao is that from which one may not depart for so much as an instant; what may be departed from is not the Dao.’3

根據以上所說的證明，人生在世，道是一時亦不敢離的。假使悖道失理，圖一時之安逸，在世要受國家法律制裁，死後更要受地獄閻君之苦。即使今生僥倖過去，然天理昭彰，絲毫不爽，豈能逃脫陰司之裁判，不報於來世乎？惟望諸位注意之！

From all that has been proven above, we see that, so long as one lives in this world, the Dao is something one dares not depart from for even a moment. Should a man defy the Dao and forsake principle for a moment’s ease, then in this life he must suffer the sanctions of the nation’s law, and after death the torments of the Lord Yama below. And even should he slip through this present life by luck, the principle of Heaven is still manifest and unerring, not off by so much as a hair’s breadth. How, then, could he escape the judgment of the netherworld courts, or go unrequited in the life to come? It is my earnest hope that you will all take this to heart!
四

天道的寶貴是什麼

Wherein Lies the Preciousness of the Heavenly Way
掃描 第 8 頁 ↗

天道的寶貴：第一是道不輕傳。第二是求道時，須有兩個介紹人，作為引保師。並在 Φ前立下宏誓大愿，證明不是左道旁門，邪教白蓮，更不是誆哄你們的錢財，及末尾兩句：「引入身家不清白，品行不端正者，愿受天譴，五雷轟身。」

The preciousness of the Heavenly Way lies, first, in this: the Dao is not lightly transmitted. And second, in this: at the receiving of the Dao there must be two who introduce the seeker, serving as the masters who guide and guarantee him. Then, before the Eternal Mother, he makes a great and solemn vow, testifying that this is no heterodox byway, no heretical White Lotus sect, and still less any scheme to cheat him of his money. The vow closes with these two lines: ‘Should the one who brings a seeker in be of unclean household or of unupright conduct, may he willingly bear Heaven’s chastisement and be struck down by the five thunderbolts.’

且你們求道時，先立十條大愿，否則雖手托萬兩黃金，也求不着。而十條愿中，實心懺悔一語，更證明未求道前都是罪人；求道以後，誠心抱守，實心懺悔改過，在社會上可以做個完善好人。若能抱道奉行，孜孜不息，更能成佛作祖。所以吾們既得真道，必要進行。茍能日征月邁，積功累德，在世定能脫劫避難，出世還可超生了死。自己九玄七祖同歸理界，這不是天道的寶貴嗎？

Moreover, at the receiving of the Dao you first make the ten great vows; without them, though you held ten thousand taels of gold in your hands, you could still not obtain it. And among those ten vows, the phrase ‘to repent with a true heart’ proves further that before receiving the Dao we were, every one of us, sinners — while after receiving it, holding fast with a sincere heart and with a true heart repenting and mending our faults, one may become, in society, a wholly good person. Should one then embrace the Dao and carry it out, diligent and never resting, one may rise even to become a buddha or a patriarch. Therefore, having obtained the true Dao, we must press on. Let one only advance day by day and press on month by month, accruing merit and heaping up virtue: then in this life one will surely escape catastrophe and avoid calamity, and beyond this life transcend birth and death as well — so that one’s own forebears of seven generations and descendants of nine return together to the realm of Principle. Is this not the preciousness of the Heavenly Way?
五

求道後不進行的原因

Why Some Do Not Press On After Receiving the Dao
掃描 第 9 頁 ↗

古聖云：「得道容易修道難，修道容易了道難。」亦可證明此題之意義。細究不進行之原因有兩種：

An ancient sage said: ‘To receive the Dao is easy, but to cultivate it is hard; to cultivate the Dao is easy, but to bring it to completion is hard.’ This too bears out the meaning of our present topic. Examined closely, the reasons people do not press on after receiving the Dao are of two kinds.

第一、求道後沒有相當研究，不明道之真義，生種種疑惑。如：（一）疑天道不真，一指難成。（二）疑天時不至，收圓無期。（三）疑緣淺冤重，考魔重且嚴厲。（四）疑功德費用處。（五）疑天機轉變，渺茫無憑。疑慮紛紛，層層而起。

First: after receiving the Dao, one does no adequate study, fails to grasp the true meaning of the Dao, and gives rise to all manner of doubts. For instance: (1) doubting that the Heavenly Way is true, and that a single pointing of the master could ever bring one to completion; (2) doubting that Heaven’s appointed hour has come, and that the Ingathering1 has any set term; (3) doubting — one’s affinity being shallow and one’s karmic grievances heavy — that the demonic trials will prove too heavy and too severe; (4) doubting whether the effort and expense laid out for merit serve any real purpose; (5) doubting the turning of Heaven’s hidden design, so remote and vague, they say, that there is nothing to rely upon. Such doubts multiply in confusion, rising layer upon layer.

第二、因被氣質矇蔽，有礙道途前進。故佛家云：「世人不能修行者，因有六種障礙。」（一）對於六根、四大假合不悟。於是有「形骸障」。（二）對於飲食男女，妄生貪着。於是有「嗜欲障」。（三）豪傑殫智力，以營世務。於是有「功名障」。（四）士才騁視聽，而工藻飾。於是有「文字障」。（五）拘常隨俗，縛而不解。則有「事障」。（六）窮玄參妙，悟而轉疑。則有「理障」。

Second: being clouded over by one’s own temperament, one is hindered on the road of the Dao. Thus the Buddhist teaching says: ‘The reason people of the world cannot cultivate is that there are six kinds of obstruction.’ (1) Not awakening to the truth that the six senses and the four elements2 are but a provisional joining — hence the obstruction of the bodily frame. (2) Over food and drink and the union of man and woman, giving rise to deluded craving — hence the obstruction of appetite and desire. (3) The bold and gifted exhausting their wits and strength in pursuit of worldly affairs — hence the obstruction of fame and rank. (4) The talented and lettered giving free rein to eye and ear and laboring over ornate phrasing — hence the obstruction of the written word. (5) Bound by convention and following the crowd, tied fast and unable to break free — hence the obstruction of affairs. (6) Probing the mysterious and pondering the subtle, then turning awakening back into doubt — hence the obstruction of abstract principle.

以上種種曚蔽，心生顛紛，怎能修道？推其原委，全係真理不明之誤。但此種病源，凡頭前辦事人，及擔引保者，都負有相當責任。

With all these veilings, the mind falls into confusion and disorder — how then can one cultivate the Dao? Trace it to its source, and the fault lies wholly in not understanding the Truth. Yet for this root-malady, those who lead the work at the fore, and those who take on the office of introducer and guarantor,3 all bear a fair share of the responsibility.

試看過去之仙佛聖神，那個不賴師之提攜，而能自己覺悟？雖云：「有來學，無往教。」然不教而成者，千百中無有一人。所以活佛師尊云：「三期末劫，大辦收圓。各壇之成敗，全在承辦人之盡力與否。」

Look at the immortals, buddhas, sages, and holy ones of the past: which of them awakened by his own effort, without relying on a teacher’s helping hand? Though it is said, ‘Let the student come to learn; the teacher does not go out to instruct,’4 yet of those who came to fruition untaught, there is not one in a thousand. And so the Holy Teacher has said: ‘In the End Times of the Third Period, the great work of the Ingathering is under way. Whether each altar succeeds or fails rests entirely on whether those who carry the work give it their full strength.’

凡入道者，在你本壇都有天職，並且自己都有後學。希望各位都要認識真理，振作精神，作己立立人，己達達人之先進。萬勿畏難苟安，誤己誤人，而獲千古之罪人。

Everyone who has entered the Dao holds a Heaven-appointed duty within his own altar, and each has juniors of his own. My hope is that all of you will come to know the Truth, rouse your spirit, and go before others — as one who, having established himself, helps others to stand, and having reached through, helps others to reach through. By no means shrink from hardship for the sake of ease, misleading yourself and misleading others, and so incurring the guilt of a sinner for all the ages.
六

天道與人道有否區別

Is There a Difference Between the Heavenly Way and the Human Way?
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天道與人道，本來沒有什麼區別，不過人的眼光遠近不同，大小不同，才有所分別。按人道來說，孝順父母、友於兄弟、信於朋友、敬於師長，方算盡到人道。但是人的環境際遇多不相同，若是嚴明之父、友愛之兄、信義之友、品端之師，則志同道合，各盡其職，而樂人倫之大道矣。否則，父若瞽叟、兄若管蔡、友若孫龐、師若申豹，豈能不權輕重，不辨是非，顧一時之小體，而遺萬世之臭名？尤其時至今日，躬逢六萬年來之奇運，若無遠大志向，只圖人情圓滿，一旦天時已至，按功定果，養其小體，名落孫山者，豈不後悔莫及？

The Heavenly Way and the human way are, at root, no different; a distinction arises only because people’s vision reaches far or near, and their scope runs great or small. Speaking of the human way: to be filial to one’s parents, brotherly to one’s siblings, faithful to one’s friends, and respectful to one’s teachers and elders — only then can one be said to have fulfilled it. But people’s circumstances and fortunes are seldom alike. If one has a strict and clear-sighted father, a loving elder brother, a faithful and dutiful friend, and a teacher of upright character, then aims align and the Way is shared: each fulfills his part, and all delight in the great Way of human relations. But suppose it is otherwise — the father a Gusou, the brother a Guan or a Cai, the friend a Sun or a Pang, the teacher a Shen Bao1. How then could one fail to weigh the greater against the lesser, or fail to tell right from wrong, tending instead the petty self of the moment, only to leave behind a foul name for ten thousand ages? All the more so today, when we ourselves meet the extraordinary opportunity of these sixty thousand years. If one lacks far-reaching aspiration and seeks only to keep every human sentiment smooth, then when Heaven’s appointed hour arrives and the fruits are fixed according to merit, those who have nursed only their lesser self — their names fallen from the list, like Sun Shan’s2 — will they not repent beyond all remedy?

且舉古聖軼事而證之：帝舜不告而娶、周公誅兄伐弟、邱祖戀情，馬丹陽與其分蒲團，各奔一方之事，不重小節而養其大節也。你們個人修道，環境情形都不同，在此千鈞一髮，升降關頭，千萬要認清目標，莫顧人情之小節，而誤萬代事功。又如釋迦佛，十九歲出家，棄父母不顧，若從表面看來，似屬不孝，但結果成了佛教之祖，揚名顯親，共返天界。南海古佛，違親修行，後證千手千眼佛，父母沾光，玄祖同昇。由此觀之，古聖先賢沒有妻朋子伴，舉家團圓，不離情枷愛鎖、恩愛纏繞，而能證果超生者。

Let the anecdotes of the ancient sages bear this out. Emperor Shun married without informing his parents; the Duke of Zhou put one brother to death and campaigned against another; Patriarch Qiu cut off a romantic attachment; Ma Danyang and his wife divided the meditation cushion and each set off in a separate direction3 — all cases of not prizing the small niceties, but nurturing the great integrity. In your own cultivation, each of you meets different circumstances. At this hair’s-breadth moment, this juncture between rising and falling, you must above all see your goal clearly, and never, for the small niceties of human feeling, ruin the great work of ten thousand generations. Take Śākyamuni Buddha again: at nineteen he left the household life and forsook his parents. Judged by the surface, this seems unfilial; yet in the end he became the founder of the Buddhist teaching, made his name renowned, and thereby brought honor to his parents, so that together they returned to the heavenly realm. So too the Ancient Buddha of the Southern Sea4, who cultivated against her parents’ wishes and later realized buddhahood as the Thousand-Hand, Thousand-Eye Buddha; her parents shared in the glory, and her ancestors ascended along with her. Seen in this light, among the ancient sages and worthies not one ever realized the fruit and transcended birth and death while keeping wife and friends and children about him — the whole household gathered together, never breaking free of the cangue of passion, the lock of love, and the coils of affection.

古鯀治水無功，舜殛鯀於羽山，禹不報父仇，更繼父志，完成治水之功，雖八年於外，三過其門而不入，終成三官大帝之一。還有耶穌與眾講道之時，其母攜其妹弟往找，要和他講話，有人告訴耶穌，他回答說：「誰是吾的母親？誰是我的弟妹？」就指著聽眾說：「看哪！凡是遵行我天父旨意，就是吾的兄弟姐妹，就是我的母親了！」耶穌終成了耶教之主。

In antiquity Gun labored at the floods without success, and Shun put him to death at Mount Yu. Yet Yu did not avenge his father; he carried on his father’s purpose instead and completed the taming of the floods — though he was abroad eight years, and passed his own door three times without once entering — and in the end became one of the Three Great Officials.5 There is also the time when Jesus was teaching the multitude, and his mother came with his brothers and sisters, seeking him and wishing to speak with him. Someone told Jesus, and he answered: ‘Who is my mother? And who are my brothers?’ Then, pointing to those who were listening, he said: ‘Behold — whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother, and sister, and mother.’6 And Jesus in the end became the Lord of the Christian faith.

以上諸位往聖，既能修成正果，他的父母玄祖，還會不超生麼？所以古語云：「慎終追遠為真孝，生事以禮為順親。若以養親為孝盡，親沒獄憂子怎分？」孝經云：「身體髮膚受之父母，不敢毁傷，孝之始也。立身行道，揚名于後世，以顯父母孝之終也。」

All these bygone sages, having cultivated to the true fruit — could their parents and ancestors then fail to be raised to new life? Thus an old saying goes: ‘To be careful in the mourning of parents and to keep faith with the distant ancestors — this is true filiality; to serve the living according to ritual — this is to accord with one’s parents. But if one takes mere provision for one’s parents to be the whole of filial duty, then once they have died and lie in torment below, how is the child to share in their deliverance?’7 And the Classic of Filial Piety says: ‘Our body, our hair and skin, we receive from our parents; not to dare to injure them is the beginning of filiality. To establish oneself and walk in the Way, making one’s name renowned in ages to come and so bringing honor to one’s parents — this is the fulfillment of filiality.’8

可知天道、人道有連帶之關係，不過有的盡人道而合天道，有的修天道而暗合人道。總之，天道、人道，合於理者為是，背於理者則非矣。

From this we may know that the Heavenly Way and the human way are bound together: some, by fulfilling the human way, come into accord with the Heavenly Way; others, by cultivating the Heavenly Way, quietly accord with the human way. In sum, for the Heavenly Way and the human way alike, what accords with principle is right, and what runs against principle is wrong.
七

何謂行功立德

What It Means to Accrue Merit and Establish Virtue
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行者，實行；功者，功用；立者，樹立；德者，美德。能實行功用，方能樹立美德也。總之不惜勞苦，而為社會人群求生、謀福利的，叫做「行功」，其效果便是立德。

‘To carry out’ means to put into practice; ‘merit’ means efficacious work; ‘to establish’ means to set firmly in place; ‘virtue’ means excellence of character. Only when one truly puts efficacious work into practice can excellence of character be firmly established. In short, to spare no toil or hardship in seeking life and welfare for society and for the community of people — this is what is called ‘accruing merit,’ and its fruit is precisely the establishing of virtue.

按行功來說，有內外兩功：

As for accruing merit, there are two kinds of work: the inner and the outer.

（一）內功：是自己正心修身，克己復禮，一言一行，不敢有一毫人欲之私。

(1) Inner work: this is to rectify one’s own heart and cultivate one’s person, to master the self and return to ritual propriety, so that in every word and every deed one dares not harbor even a hair’s breadth of selfish desire.

（二）外功：是開荒下種，設立法船，不惜精神物力，犧牲一切，屈己從人，為道設想。

(2) Outer work: this is to open new ground and sow the seed, to launch the ship of the Dharma — sparing neither spirit nor means, sacrificing everything, bending oneself to accommodate others, and taking thought for the Dao.

缺內功則本源不清，少外功則德行不圓。所以《勝鬘經》云：「惡盡言功；善滿曰德。」六祖云：「內心謙下是功；外行於禮是德。」「自性建立萬法是功，心體離念是德。」「不離自性是功，應用無染是德。」「見性是功，平等是德。」平等者，即宇宙一切眾生，皆歸一體，而無差別也。

Without inner work, the wellspring is not pure; without outer work, one’s virtuous conduct is not complete. Thus the Śrīmālā Sūtra says: ‘When evil is exhausted, we speak of merit; when goodness is full, we call it virtue.’1 And the Sixth Patriarch says: ‘Inward humility of heart is merit; outward conduct according to ritual is virtue’; ‘For the self-nature to bring forth all things is merit; for the substance of the mind to be free of clinging thought is virtue’; ‘Not to depart from the self-nature is merit; to act without defilement is virtue’; ‘To see one’s nature is merit; impartial equality is virtue.’2 By ‘impartial equality’ is meant that all the living beings of the universe return to a single body, with no distinction among them.

佛戒有云：「一言必謹，言有功也。」由此觀之，我們之言行意念，是否邪正，有莫大關係。佛戒有云：「清清勿使昏迷，防意如防城之危。惺惺勿使散亂，守心比守身之嚴。」 諺云：「防意如防疫。」可知行功立德，在於外功促進，更在內功慎獨。

The Buddhist precepts say: ‘Let every word be measured — in such speech there is merit.’ Seen in this light, whether our speech, our conduct, and our thoughts run crooked or straight is a matter of the utmost consequence. The Buddhist precepts also say: ‘Keep clear and pure, and let no dullness cloud you; guard your thoughts as you would guard a city against its fall. Stay bright and awake, and let no disorder scatter you; keep watch over the mind more strictly than over the body.’ As the proverb has it: ‘Guard your thoughts as you guard against a plague.’ From this we may know that accruing merit and establishing virtue lie in advancing the outer work — and still more in the inner work of watchfulness when alone.
八

何謂尊師重道

What It Means to Honor the Teacher and Revere the Dao
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三期末運，真道降世，凡受明師一點者，自己可以脫劫免難，超生了死，即九玄七祖亦能同登天梯，共達極樂，可知受師恩德廣矣！大矣！然而既承師德，怎樣報呢？就是該尊敬老師了！

In the End Times of the Third Period, the true Dao has descended into the world. Whoever receives the single pointing of the enlightened master1 may, for himself, escape the great catastrophe and be spared calamity, and so transcend birth and death; and even his ancestors of seven generations and his descendants of nine may climb the ladder to Heaven together with him and reach the realm of Ultimate Bliss. From this one may know how broad, how great, is the grace and virtue we receive from the master. And since we have received the master’s virtue, how are we to repay it? By honoring our teacher, as is only right.

可是尊師真義，並非只圖表面上之供養與尊敬，更要「體師之心，尊師之訓，效師之行，繼師之志，行師之道，了師之愿，欽師之意」，而成心心相印，不約而同之事蹟，方為真正之尊師。

Yet the true meaning of honoring the teacher does not lie merely in outward offerings and outward respect. It asks something more — ‘to embody the teacher’s heart, to honor the teacher’s instruction, to model the teacher’s conduct, to carry on the teacher’s aspiration, to walk the teacher’s Way, to fulfill the teacher’s vows, and to revere the teacher’s intent’ — until heart is sealed to heart, and, as if by unspoken accord, deed answers to deed. Only this is truly to honor the teacher.

《論語》云：「有事弟子服其勞，有酒食先生饌。」亦是述明尊師之意。再如七十二子之尊孔子、萬章等之尊孟子，雖然各有不同，而殊途同歸，沒有不是以心印心，實行真正之尊師也。

The Analects says: ‘When there is work to be done, the disciple takes on the toil; when there is wine and food, the elder is served first.’2 This too sets forth the meaning of honoring the teacher. So it was when the seventy-two disciples honored Confucius, and when Wan Zhang and the rest honored Mencius: though each did so in his own way, all arrived by different roads at the same end, every one of them sealing mind to mind and putting into practice the true honoring of the teacher.

重道者何？即處處以道為前提，寧可屈己從人，見道成道，決不私心利己，困窮敗節。所以，以道為重者，定然守死善道，不虧大節，造次必於是，顛沛必於是。古聖云：「君子謀道不謀食，憂道不憂貧。」又云：「仁以為己任，不亦重乎？死而後已，不亦遠乎？」都是證明道的寶貴，莫要輕看。

And what is it to revere the Dao? It is to hold the Dao foremost in all things: to bend oneself to follow others, and to bring the Dao to fulfillment wherever it is seen, rather than ever serve one’s own private gain or, in hardship and want, let one’s integrity fail. Therefore whoever holds the Dao in reverence will surely ‘guard the good Way even unto death,’3 never failing in the great points of conduct — ‘in moments of haste cleaving to it, in times of upheaval cleaving to it.’4 The ancient sages said: ‘The gentleman seeks the Dao and does not seek his food; he sorrows over the Dao and does not sorrow over poverty.’5 And again: ‘To take benevolence as one’s own burden — is it not heavy? To lay it down only in death — is it not a long road?’6 All this proves how precious the Dao is, never to be lightly regarded.

可是，尊師與重道，離不開的。因為道在師傳，不得不尊師；師的本意為傳道，道又不可不重。若偏於尊師，則落執象，而成人情矣；偏於重道，則落頑空，而成虛情矣。所以尊師重道，有連帶關係，實是一而二，二而一，不過是一體兩面罷了。諸位宜參之悟之！

Yet honoring the teacher and revering the Dao cannot be parted. Because the Dao is transmitted through the teacher, one cannot but honor the teacher; and because the teacher’s whole purpose is to transmit the Dao, the Dao cannot but be revered. Lean too far toward honoring the teacher, and one falls into clinging to outward forms, until it turns into mere human sentiment; lean too far toward revering the Dao, and one falls into a barren emptiness, until it turns into hollow feeling. And so honoring the teacher and revering the Dao are bound together — truly one yet two, two yet one, no more than two faces of a single body. Let everyone ponder this and awaken to it!
九

因果與報應

Cause and Effect, and Retribution
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世人不能諸惡莫作，眾善奉行者，都是因為不明因果報應之理而為也。

That people of the world cannot ‘commit no evil and practice every good’1 comes about entirely because they do not understand the principle of cause and effect and its retribution.

孔子云：「善不積，不足以揚名；惡不積，不足以滅身。」

Confucius said: ‘Unless good is heaped up, it is not enough to win a name; unless evil is heaped up, it is not enough to ruin the self.’2

關聖云：「善惡兩途，福禍攸分。」

Lord Guan said: ‘Good and evil are two roads, and upon them blessing and calamity divide.’3

老君曰：「種瓜得瓜，種豆得豆。種不失時，十年根生蒂結。是瓜是豆，依然得還。」

Lord Lao said: ‘Plant melons and you get melons; plant beans and you get beans. Sow without missing the season, and in ten years the roots strike and the fruit sets. Be it melon or bean, each comes back to you all the same.’4

感應篇云：「禍福無門，惟人自召。善惡之報，如影隨形。」

The Treatise on Action and Response says: ‘Calamity and blessing have no gate of their own; it is a man himself who summons them. The recompense of good and evil follows him as the shadow follows the shape.’5

因果經云：「欲知前世因，今生受者身；欲知來世果，今生作者心。」

The Sutra of Cause and Effect says: ‘Would you know the cause of your former life? — it is what your body now bears in this one. Would you know the fruit of your life to come? — it is what your heart now does in this one.’6

地藏經云：「作善作惡，從來絲毫不爽。降禍降福，賞罰自古無差。」

The Kṣitigarbha Sutra says: ‘For deeds of good and deeds of evil there has never been the slightest miscount; in the sending down of calamity or of blessing, reward and punishment have from of old never erred.’7

燃燈佛云：「一毫之善，與人方便；一毫之惡，勸人莫作。」「衣食隨緣，自然快樂。饒人是福，欺人是禍。」

Dīpaṃkara Buddha said: ‘With even a hair’s-breadth of good, ease the way for others; against even a hair’s-breadth of evil, urge others not to do it.’ And: ‘Let food and clothing follow their given lot, and gladness comes of itself. To pardon others is a blessing; to cheat them is a calamity.’8

孟子曰：「天作孽，猶可違；自作孽，不可活。」

Mencius said: ‘When Heaven sends down calamity, it may still be evaded; but calamity of one’s own making leaves no room to live on.’9

易云：「積善之家，必有餘慶；積不善之家，必有餘殃。」

The Book of Changes says: ‘The house that heaps up goodness is sure to have blessings to spare; the house that heaps up evil is sure to have woes to spare.’10

書云：「作善降之百祥；作不善降之百殃。」

The Book of Documents says: ‘On the doer of good, Heaven sends down a hundred blessings; on the doer of evil, a hundred woes.’11

以上述古聖先賢之言論，證明種什麼，得什麼，因果報應是絕對不錯的。再拿現世來論，你若對人家恩惠，人家必感謝你；你若對人家凌虐，人家必忿恨你。就按過去在舞臺上稱能稱強，耀武揚威，恃勢力而凌迫孤寡的貪官污吏們，一旦惡貫滿盈，土崩瓦解，還不是死的死，囚的囚嗎？一般土豪劣紳，過去狐假虎威，稱霸一時，如今還不是東跑西顛，無家可歸？由此觀之，因果報應，是天演的正理，不過來早與來遲而已。

The sayings of the ancient sages and worthies cited above all prove that what one sows, one reaps: cause and effect and its retribution are absolutely without error. Take the present world as well. Show kindness to others, and they are sure to be grateful to you; abuse and oppress others, and they are sure to hold you in bitter resentment. Consider the greedy officials and corrupt clerks of the past, who strutted upon the stage of the world calling themselves able and strong, flaunting their might and leaning on their power to trample the orphaned and the widowed. Once their measure of evil was full, they collapsed like crumbling earth and shattering tile — and did not the dead among them die, and the caged end in cages? And the local despots and vicious gentry who once played the fox borrowing the tiger’s terror, lording it for a season — are they not now scattered and fleeing this way and that, with no home to return to? Seen in this light, cause and effect and its retribution are the rightful principle of Heaven’s own working; it is only a matter of coming early or coming late.

故諺云：「善因善報，惡因惡報。如若不報，時辰未到。」可知前因後果，是絲毫不差的。

Hence the proverb: ‘A good cause, a good requital; an evil cause, an evil requital. If the requital has not yet come, it is only that the hour has not yet arrived.’ From this one may know that cause before and effect after are not off by the slightest measure.
十

冤欠之由來與解消

The Origin of Karmic Debts and How to Dissolve Them
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凡不經對方同意，從中取利，陰謀暗算，損人利己，使人遭不白者謂之冤。雖經對方同意，久以借貸，而結果外恩欠義，缺少未還者謂之欠。冤欠之事，人人有之。推其原委，多係不明因果報應而做，致日積月累，年世相疊，就日甚一日了。

Whenever, without the other’s consent, one profits at his expense — scheming in secret, harming others for one’s own gain, leaving someone to suffer a wrong unredressed — this is called a grievance (冤). And whenever, even with the other’s consent, as in a long-standing loan, one turns cold to the kindness and defaults on what is right, falling short and leaving the debt unpaid — this is called a debt (欠). Grievances and debts are something everyone has. Trace them to their source, and most are incurred through not understanding cause and effect and its retribution; and so, unredeemed, they pile up day upon day, year upon year, age upon age, growing heavier all the while.

因人秉天地之正氣而生，受天覆地載，日月所照，雨露所養，五穀水火之化育，方能寄生在世。但人既蒙天地如此之厚恩，是否應當行仁行義，順天地之正道，以報天恩哉？惜乎世人渺茫此意，不但不報答天恩，更有肆無忌憚者，作怨天欺人之事，還能說他不欠天恩嗎？又如父母生養劬勞之恩，終此身亦難報答。虧於孝道，豈不是又欠了父母之恩嗎？其他夫妻寡恩、兒女少慈、朋友缺信、師徒斷義，無非欠的由來。

For a person is born endowed with the upright qi of Heaven and Earth. Heaven covers him and Earth sustains him; the sun and moon give him light, the rain and dew their nourishment, the five grains and water and fire their sustenance — and only so can he lodge for a while as a guest in the world. Having received such lavish grace from Heaven and Earth, ought he not to practice benevolence and righteousness, to walk the upright Way of Heaven and Earth, and so repay Heaven’s grace? Sadly, the people of the world are blind to this. Not only do they fail to repay Heaven’s grace; there are even those who, wholly without restraint, resent Heaven and cheat their fellows — and can such a one be said to owe no debt to Heaven’s grace? Or consider the grace of one’s parents, who bore and reared us through all their toil — a grace a whole lifetime can scarcely repay. To fall short in filial duty: is this not, once again, to owe a debt to the grace of one’s parents? And so with all the rest — a spouse stinting in kindness, children wanting in love, friends failing in trust, master and disciple severing what is right — all alike are origins of debt.

冤者就是吾們貪圖口腹，恣殺生靈，及無意中踏死螞蟻、傷害昆蟲等，莫非冤之由來。更有無知之輩，迷昧真性，作一切奸盜邪淫、殺人放火、暗謀暗算、傷天害理之事。豈知人各有性，物各有靈，凡受冤欠者，那有不討之理？況今三期末劫，正應清算之日。我們修道者，若不將六萬年來所積之冤欠，一一還清，如何能返回理天呢？

As for grievances: our craving for the pleasures of the palate, our wanton slaughter of living creatures, even the ants we tread to death unawares and the insects we harm — every one of these is an origin of grievance. Worse still are the ignorant who, blind to their own true nature, commit every kind of wickedness — theft and lechery, killing and arson, secret scheming and plotting, offending Heaven and violating right principle. Do they not know that every person has a nature and every creature a soul, and that those who have been wronged and left owed will never fail to come and collect their due? And how much more so now, in the final catastrophe of the Third Period — the very day appointed for the settling of accounts. If we who cultivate the Dao do not repay, one by one, the grievances and debts heaped up across sixty thousand years, how can we ever return to the Heaven of Principle?

試看人世，決無帶罪的官吏，理天更無帶罪的仙佛。我們修道是為了超生了死，欲了生死必須將冤欠還清。但如何還呢？就是懇求　上天慈憫，一面庇護咱們，暫時將咱的冤欠擔起，另一面吾們速速行功，以後超渡他們，將功折還，冤欠豈不是自然消解嗎？

Look at the human world: no official holds office while still charged with a crime; and in the Heaven of Principle, all the more, no immortal or buddha ascends while still bearing such a charge. We cultivate the Dao in order to transcend birth and death; and to be done with birth and death, we must repay our grievances and debts in full. But how are they to be repaid? By earnestly imploring the mercy of High Heaven — asking, on the one hand, that it shelter us, taking our grievances and debts upon itself for a time; and on the other, that we ourselves swiftly accrue merit, so that hereafter we may help to deliver those we have wronged, offsetting the debt with merit. Will not the grievances and debts then dissolve of themselves?
十一

為何齋戒及齋戒之利益

Why Keep the Vegetarian Precepts, and Their Benefits
掃描 第 19 頁 ↗

我們既修天道，須體天心。天有好生之德，以仁慈為本。那麼吾們修道人，也應該以仁慈為本，速速清口茹素。故呂祖云：「我肉眾生肉，形殊理不殊；休令閻君斷，自問應如何？」可知過去的仙佛賢真、三教聖人，都是清口茹素，漸漸而成。道之三清五行；佛之三皈五戒，直示明言，昭昭在耳，無疑的證明了佛道齋戒，證之不誤。

Since we cultivate the Heavenly Way, we must embody the heart of Heaven. Heaven has the virtue of cherishing life, and takes benevolence and compassion as its root; we who cultivate the Dao ought likewise to take benevolence and compassion as our root, and hasten to keep a pure mouth and eat only vegetarian fare. Thus Patriarch Lü said: ‘My flesh is the flesh of all living beings; the forms differ, but the principle is one. Do not wait for Lord Yama to pass sentence — ask your own heart what ought to be done.’1 From this we may know that the immortals and buddhas, the sages and realized ones of ages past, and the sages of the Three Teachings all kept a pure mouth and a vegetarian diet, and so, little by little, came to their attainment. The Dao has its Three Purities and Five Phases, and Buddhism its Three Refuges and Five Precepts — all plainly shown and clearly spoken, ringing clear in the ear. Here is proof beyond any doubt that the keeping of the vegetarian precepts in Buddhism and the Dao is no mistaken thing.

可是儒門的孔老夫子又何嘗不是清口茹素呢？不過孔子當日無權無位的人，為了避免他人的諷剌，所以危行言遜，都是含而不露。試觀鄉黨篇上所載：「沽酒巿脯不食，色惡不食，臭惡不食，失飪不食，不時不食，割不正不食，不得其醬不食，不撤薑食」等語。以及季康子宴孔子，不肉而食。孔子一月三齋，致齋三日，散齋七日。又子之所慎「齋、戰、疾」，都證明孔子齋戒，實無可疑。

But was not Confucius himself, the venerable Master of the Confucian school, one who kept a pure mouth and a vegetarian diet? In his day, to be sure, Confucius was a man without power or position, and to avoid the ridicule of others he kept his conduct upright but his words deferential,2 holding all within and never putting it on display. Consider what is recorded in the ‘Xiang Dang’ chapter: ‘Wine bought in the market and dried meat from the shop, he would not eat. Food gone off in color, he would not eat; ill-smelling, he would not eat; badly cooked, he would not eat; out of season, he would not eat; cut awry, he would not eat; lacking its proper sauce, he would not eat; and he never went without ginger at his meals.’3 So too, when Ji Kangzi feasted him, he ate no meat; and Confucius observed abstinence three times a month — three days of intensive purification and seven of ordinary purification. Again, ‘the things about which the Master was most careful were purificatory abstinence, war, and sickness.’4 All of this proves, beyond any doubt, that Confucius kept the vegetarian precepts.

按孟子說：「見其生，不忍見其死；聞其聲，不忍食其肉。是以君子遠庖廚也。」又曰：「雞豚狗彘，不失其時，七十者可以食肉矣。」但人至七十，血氣既衰，腸胃消化不良，更兼齒活牙落，不能咀嚼，如何能食肉呢？即使身體強壯，食肉一事，總非相宜。再者，俗語說：人生七十古來稀。更顯得來到七十，就快要死去，還會趕上食肉嗎？由此可知，不僅孟子齋戒，更勸人人齋戒矣。

Mencius said: ‘Having seen them alive, he cannot bear to see them die; having heard their cries, he cannot bear to eat their flesh. Therefore the noble man keeps his distance from the kitchen.’5 And again: ‘Let the raising of fowls and pigs, dogs and swine not be neglected in their season, and those who are seventy may eat meat.’6 But by the age of seventy a person’s vital energies are already in decline; the stomach and bowels digest poorly, and with teeth loosened or fallen he can no longer chew — how, then, is he to eat meat? And even for one still hale and strong, the eating of meat is never truly fitting. Moreover, as the common saying has it, ‘Since olden times, few have reached seventy.’7 All the more does this show that one who has come to seventy is already near death — will he even live to eat that meat? From this we may know that Mencius not only kept the vegetarian precepts himself, but urged everyone else to keep them too.

蓋五葷三厭、煙酒之類，均是昏性之物。五葷者，即蔥、韭、薤、蒜、興蕖，乃天地不正之氣生成，易傷五臟元氣。三厭者，天厭「飛禽」、地厭「走獸」、水厭「水族」，乃橫行之物，各秉一方之氣而生，食之易傷三寶原靈，更要暗損陰德。菸酒者，亦是消耗元氣元靈之物，我們皆當戒除。因為吾們修道，是去濁留清、煉陰補陽。若縱情嗜欲，貪圖口腹，豈能修成？

For the five pungent roots, the three forbidden creatures, and such things as tobacco and wine are all substances that cloud the nature. The five pungent roots — scallion, garlic-chives, shallot, garlic, and asafoetida — are engendered by the errant, disordered vapors of Heaven and Earth, and readily harm the vital energy of the five organs. The three forbidden creatures — Heaven’s forbidden, the winged fowl; Earth’s forbidden, the running beasts; and the Water’s forbidden, the creatures of the deep — are all creatures that move crosswise through the world, each brought forth by the vapor of a single quarter. To eat them readily harms the Three Treasures and one’s original spirit, and secretly diminishes one’s hidden virtue besides. Tobacco and wine, too, drain away the vital energy and the spirit; all of these we ought to renounce. For our cultivation of the Dao is a casting-off of the turbid and a keeping of the clear, a refining of the yin and a replenishing of the yang. If we give free rein to our appetites and covet the pleasures of the palate, how can our cultivation ever come to fruition?

就拿三期末劫的造成，還不是人畜迭食，累世積成的嗎？你看古詩云：「千百年來碗裡羹，冤深似海恨難平。欲知世上刀兵劫，但聽屠門夜半聲。」說的多麼明顯。且一切眾生皆有佛性，因他前世癡迷，造下罪惡，今生轉畜受報，使其受苦了罪而已。如今吾們宰他殺他，剖腹開膛、切剁割刮、烹炒煎燴，適我口而飽我腹，美我膚而肥我身。試問天理何在？良心何在？所以佛有戒云：「恃我勢而凌彼弱，恐理非宜。食他肉而養吾體，良心何安？」

Take the very making of the End Times of the Third Period — is it not the accumulation of age upon age, of humans and beasts devouring one another by turns? Look at the old poem: ‘A thousand years and more, the broth within the bowl — its grievance deep as the sea, its rancor never stilled. Would you know the calamity of sword and spear that afflicts the world? Only listen, at midnight, to the cries from the butcher’s gate.’8 How plainly it speaks! And all living beings possess the buddha-nature. Because in former lives they were deluded and heaped up sin and evil, in this life they have turned into beasts to bear the recompense, suffering only that they may work off their guilt. Yet now we butcher and slay them. We split their bellies and open their entrails; we cut and chop and slice and scrape; we boil and fry and sear and stew — all to please our mouths and fill our bellies, to make our skin fair and our bodies fat. Where, I ask, is the principle of Heaven in this? Where is conscience? And so the Buddhist precepts say: ‘To lean on my own strength and trample the weak — surely this is against all reason. To eat another’s flesh to nourish my own body — how then can the conscience rest at ease?’

既然如此，我們生生死死，代代的罪孽，如何挽救呢？主要便是清口茹素。因現在三期末劫，上天大開慈憫，只要立志清口之人，便將前債積業，俟他行功立德，以消還之。否則一面消，一面造，無濟於事。是終久不成的。現在三災八難頻頻而臨，凡長久茹素者身體清潔，仙佛易於護佑，不致遭入劫凶。再者三期末劫大辦收圓，諸天仙佛打幫助道。你的靈體清潔，仙佛易於運用，必借你建立功德，以後更有合靈時候。

This being so, how are we to redeem the sins we have piled up through birth after birth, generation after generation? Chiefly, by keeping a pure mouth and a vegetarian diet. For now, in the End Times of the Third Period, High Heaven has opened wide its compassion: for anyone who sets his will upon a pure diet, Heaven will take up his former debts and accumulated karma and hold them in abeyance, waiting for him to accrue merit and establish virtue, and so work them off. Otherwise he wipes out debt with one hand while heaping it up with the other, to no avail, and in the end will never succeed. Now, as the three disasters and eight afflictions press upon us again and again, whoever keeps a vegetarian diet over the long term keeps his body pure; the immortals and buddhas can then readily shield and protect him, so that he does not fall into the calamities of the age. Moreover, in the End Times of the Third Period the great work of the final ingathering is under way, and the immortals and buddhas of all the heavens lend their aid to the Dao. If your spiritual body is pure, the immortals and buddhas can readily make use of it, and will surely work merit through you — and there will yet come a time of communion of spirits.

希望你們速速認清，身體力行，竭力成全你的後學，和你的家庭，使未清口者清口，未立愿者立愿。真是三期修道人人有份，公修公得，婆修婆得，不修不得。但吾對各位的期望，是都能脫過末劫，靈性歸根，三元大會上，神人共樂，舉家團圓才好呢！

My hope is that you will see this clearly, and soon — that you will put it into practice in your own person, and strive with all your strength to bring your juniors and your households to completion, leading those who have not yet vowed to a pure diet to take it up, and those who have not yet made their vows to make them. Truly, in this Third Period, cultivation has a share for everyone: the man cultivates and the man gains, the woman cultivates and the woman gains, and whoever does not cultivate gains nothing. But my deepest longing, for each of you, is this: that you may all pass safely through the final catastrophe, that your spiritual nature may return to its root, and that at the Grand Assembly of the Three Primes the divine and the human may rejoice together and the whole family be reunited. That would be well indeed!
十二

徹底認清真假

Discerning the True from the False, Thoroughly
掃描 第 22 頁 ↗

世界一切事物，有真必有假，有假必有真，因此係對待之理。無真不顯假，無假亦不顯真。在各位對此題之解，都說「道真、理真、天命真、靈性真」。不錯！一切無形無象之理，是真的！又說：「三六左道，七二旁門。」自己色身和一切有形有象、有氣有色，都是假的！講的都不錯！而且很好！

Among all the things of this world, wherever there is a true there must be a false, and wherever there is a false there must be a true — for this is the principle of complementary opposites. Without the true, the false does not appear; without the false, neither does the true. In answer to this question, you all say: ‘The Dao is true, the Principle is true, the Heavenly Mandate is true, the spiritual nature is true.’ Quite right — every principle that is without form and without image is true! And you also say: ‘The thirty-six deviant paths, the seventy-two heterodox gates’ — that one’s own physical body, and all that has form and image, breath and color, is false. What you say is entirely right, and very well put!

可是不久，萬教齊起。三六七二，皆言奉天承運，辦理普渡收圓，並且法術驚人，顯化種種。郅那時候真真假假，實不易識。但我們遇此關頭，便要拿出超絕的智慧，來考驗他的道脈是否正？道理是否真？天命是否真？其一切有作有為，著重形象之處，便應徹底認識清楚。有了把握才行，否則非常危險。

Before long, however, a myriad sects arise all at once. The thirty-six and the seventy-two all claim to act in compliance with Heaven and to carry out its destiny, to conduct the universal deliverance and the final ingathering; and their magical arts are startling, manifesting wonders of every kind. By then the true and the false are so intermingled that they are truly hard to tell apart. When we come to this juncture, we must bring forth a surpassing wisdom to put them to the test: Is the lineage of their Dao orthodox? Is their doctrine true? Is their Heavenly Mandate true? In all that they contrive and do, in all their stress upon outward forms, we ought to discern the matter thoroughly and clearly. Only with sure footing may we proceed; otherwise the danger is very great.

各位都說靈性是真，色身是假。在此末劫之年，得遇真道，不圖色身安樂，只求靈性出苦，固然不錯。但是你的靈性，怎麼出苦呢？便是一念真假了。念真則一切皆真，並且雖假，亦可成真；念假一切皆假，雖真而亦成假。真假之分在於一念發動之始。故心中真偽，更應徹底認清。

You all say that the spiritual nature is true and the physical body false. In these years of the final catastrophe, having met with the true Dao, you seek not the ease and comfort of the body but only the release of the spiritual nature from suffering — and this, to be sure, is right. But how is your spiritual nature to be released from suffering? It turns on whether a single thought is true or false. If the thought is true, then all is true, and even what is false can be made true; if the thought is false, then all is false, and even what is true is turned to falsehood. The dividing line between true and false lies in the very first stirring of a single thought. And so the true and the false within the heart must all the more be discerned thoroughly and clearly.
十三

認清魔考之真意

Understanding the True Meaning of Demonic Trials
掃描 第 24 頁 ↗

魔考二字，是吾們修道人必經之路徑。所以說：「修道未知考者，不足與談也。」又曰：「有道一定有魔，道魔如影隨形。」欲想成道，必須從魔考中煆煉出來。故道曰：「不煉不成真。」儒曰：「不考不成聖。」釋曰：「不磨不煉不成佛。」諺云：「玉不琢，不成器；金不煉，不值錢。」

The two words ‘demonic trials’ name a road that we who cultivate the Dao must all pass along. Hence the saying: ‘One who cultivates the Dao yet knows nothing of trials is not worth talking with.’ And again: ‘Where there is the Dao, there is surely the demon; the Dao and the demon follow each other as shadow follows form.’ Whoever would perfect the Dao must be forged and tempered in the very midst of the demonic trials. And so the Daoists say, ‘Without refining, nothing true is made’; the Confucians say, ‘Without testing, no one becomes a sage’; the Buddhists say, ‘Without grinding and refining, no one becomes a buddha.’ As the proverb has it: ‘Jade uncarved is made into no vessel; gold unrefined is worth nothing.’

凡吾修道者，經過魔考，要知正是　上天造就吾們。茲將魔考真意，分列數項，望眾參之。

Whenever we who cultivate the Dao pass through the demonic trials, we must understand that this is precisely Heaven’s way of making us. Let me now set out the true meaning of the demonic trials under several heads, for you all to ponder.

（一）分真偽：天時已至，收圓臨邇。而一般修道之人，仍然良莠混淆，真假難分。更有順人情，悖天理，妄造黑白，無事生非，假公濟私，心性陰險，作種種傷天害理之事。致使一般真修者遭不白之冤。故天降考魔，拔精選粹，淘汰不良，然後真偽判出。一般真心修煉者，瑕疵既無，好辦三期收圓之事也。

(1) To sort the true from the false. The appointed time of Heaven has come, and the final ingathering draws near.1 Yet among those who cultivate the Dao, the good and the worthless are still mingled together, and the true is hard to tell from the false. There are even those who indulge human feeling and defy the principle of Heaven — who recklessly call black white, who stir up trouble out of nothing, who serve their private ends under public pretexts, dark and treacherous in nature, working every kind of deed that wounds Heaven and harms what is right. By this they cause the truly cultivated to suffer wrongs they never earned. And so Heaven sends down the trials of the demon, to pick out the pure and the choice and winnow away the unworthy; then the true and the false stand judged apart. Those who cultivate with a genuine heart, being now without flaw, are fit to take up the work of the final ingathering of the Third Period.

（二）消冤孽：吾人已往生生死死，六萬年之冤孽債賬，如山似海。今生得求天道，累世冤欠豈能容你？故　皇天萬分慈悲，降下考魔，切磋琢磨，以見真志，而了夙愆。凡經一次考，必了一次冤欠，漸漸孽重轉輕，化死為活。古往聖賢仙佛，皆從考魔中煆煉而成。

(2) To dissolve karmic debts. Through all our past lives, birth after birth and death after death, the debts of grievance and wrong we have piled up over sixty thousand years stand like mountains and seas. In this life we have been granted the seeking of the Heavenly Way — but how should the karmic debts of lifetime upon lifetime simply let us go? And so August Heaven, in its boundless compassion, sends down the trials of the demon: cutting and grinding, carving and polishing us, to reveal our true resolve and settle our ancient faults. Every trial we pass through settles one measure of karmic debt; little by little the heavy weight of wrong grows light, and what was dead is brought back to life. The sages and worthies, the immortals and buddhas of every age past, were each one of them forged and tempered in the trials of the demon.

（三）化稟性：因人落於後天，氣質變化不同，就分成萬有不齊之性，都不合乎中道。即一般修道者，是己非人，愩高務遠，虛浮矜燥，粗心大意，行矣不著，習矣不察之處，在在難免。若能受幾次魔考，碰幾回釘子，自然回心轉意，懺悔改過，化稟性而還天性。

(3) To transform the temperamental nature. Because a person, once fallen into the acquired world, is molded differently in disposition and endowment, there arise natures of ten thousand kinds, none of them even, and none of them in keeping with the Mean. So it is that those who cultivate the Dao can seldom avoid holding themselves right and others wrong — haughty and grasping at the far-off, flighty and vain and rash, careless and inattentive, acting without understanding why and practicing from habit without examining it.2 Yet let a person weather a few demonic trials and strike his head against a few nails, and of himself he will turn his heart and change his mind, repent and mend his faults, transforming the temperamental nature and returning to the nature given by Heaven.

（四）定品位：九品蓮臺，按功而定。所謂真道真考見真心，全在坎坷困難之中。天考人驗，看你志向、見解、學問、造詣而定升降。

(4) To fix one’s rank. The nine grades of the lotus throne3 are assigned according to merit. As the saying goes, the true Dao and true trials reveal the true heart — and this is decided wholly in the midst of hardship and adversity. Heaven sends the trial, and man is put to the proof: it is your aspiration, your insight, your learning, and your attainment that determine whether you rise or fall.

故孔子在陳蔡絕糧七日，從者皆病，孔子愈慷慨講誦，絃歌不輟。乃召子路而問曰：「詩云：『匪兕匪虎，率彼曠野。』吾道非乎？奚為至於此？」子路慍作色而對曰：「君子無所困，意者夫子未仁歟？人之弗吾信也。意者夫子未智歟？人之弗吾行也。且由也，昔者聞諸夫子曰：『為善，天報之以福；為不善，天報之以禍。』今夫子積德懷義，行之久矣，奚居之窮也。」子曰：「由未之識也！吾語汝。汝以仁者為必信也，則伯夷、叔齊不餓死首陽；汝以智者為必用也，則王子比干不見剖心；汝以忠者為必報之，則關龍逢不見刑；汝以諫者為必聽也，則伍子胥不見殺。夫遇不遇者，時也；賢不肖者，才也。君子博學深謀，而不遇者眾矣。何獨丘哉？且芝蘭生於幽林，不以無人而不芳；君子修道立德，不為貧困而改節。為之者人也，生死者命也。是以晉重耳之有霸心，生於曹衛；越王句踐有霸心，生於會稽。故下而無憂者，則思不遠；處身而常逸者，則志不廣。焉知其始終乎？」

So it was that Confucius, cut off from grain between Chen and Cai for seven days,4 his followers all fallen sick, only expounded and recited the more fervently, his lute and his singing never ceasing. He called Zilu before him and asked: ‘The Book of Songs says, “Neither wild oxen nor tigers, yet they are driven through that wilderness.”5 Is my Way wrong? Why have we come to this?’ Zilu, his face darkening with resentment, replied: ‘I had thought a gentleman meets with no such straits. Can it be that the Master is not yet wholly benevolent, so that men will not trust us? Can it be that the Master is not yet wholly wise, so that men will not let our Way go forward? Besides, Master, I once heard you say: “Do good, and Heaven rewards you with blessing; do ill, and Heaven repays you with disaster.” Now you, Master, have heaped up virtue and cherished what is right, and have practiced it long — how is it, then, that you dwell in such want?’ Confucius said: ‘Zilu, you have not yet grasped it! Let me tell you. If the benevolent must always be trusted, then Bo Yi and Shu Qi would not have starved on Mount Shouyang; if the wise must always be employed, then Prince Bi Gan would not have had his heart cut out; if the loyal must always be requited, then Guan Longfeng would not have been put to death; if the remonstrator must always be heeded, then Wu Zixu would not have been slain.6 Whether a man meets his time is a matter of the hour; whether he is worthy or unworthy is a matter of his gifts. Gentlemen of broad learning and deep counsel who yet do not meet their time are many — how should I, Qiu, be the only one? The iris and the orchid grow in the deep wood, and do not withhold their fragrance because no one is near; the gentleman cultivates the Dao and establishes virtue, and does not change his measure for poverty and want. To act rightly is a matter for man; whether one lives or dies is a matter of fate. Thus the ambition for mastery in Chong’er of Jin was born of his hardships in Cao and Wei, and the ambition for mastery in King Goujian of Yue was born at Kuaiji. A man set low who feels no care thinks nothing far; a man always at ease in himself has no breadth of resolve. Who, then, can know a man’s beginning and his end?’

子路出，召子貢，告如子路。子貢曰：「夫子之道至大，故天下不能容。夫子盍少貶焉？」子曰：「賜！良農能稼，未必能穡；良工能巧，不能為順。君子能修其道，綱而紀之，不必其能容。今不修其道，而求其容。賜！爾志不廣矣！思不遠矣！」

Zilu went out, and Zigong was called in, and Confucius put to him what he had put to Zilu. Zigong said: ‘The Master’s Way is supremely great — that is why the world cannot contain it. Might the Master not bring it down a little?’ Confucius said: ‘Zigong! A good farmer can sow, yet cannot be sure of the harvest; a skilled craftsman can work with cunning, yet cannot make his work suit every eye. The gentleman can cultivate his Way, and order and shape it, but he cannot be sure the world will accept it. And now you would leave off cultivating your Way, and seek only to be accepted. Zigong! Your resolve is not broad, and your thought does not reach far!’

子貢出。顏淵入。問亦如之。顏淵曰：「夫子之道至大，天下莫能容。雖然夫子推而行之，世不我用，有國者之醜也！夫子何病焉？不容，然後見君子。」孔子欣然嘆曰：「有道哉！顏氏之子！使爾多才，吾為爾宰。」

Zigong went out, and Yan Hui came in, and the same question was put to him. Yan Hui said: ‘The Master’s Way is supremely great, and so the world cannot contain it. Yet even so, the Master presses it forward and puts it into practice. That the age has no use for us — this is the disgrace of those who hold the states; what fault is it of the Master’s? It is only when one is not accepted that the gentleman is revealed!’ Confucius sighed with delight: ‘The Way is in him indeed, this son of the house of Yan! Were you a man of great talent, I would gladly be your steward.’7

根據以上諸子所言不同，則知其造詣成就定有差別。以後孔子成至聖，顏子成復聖；子貢成十哲，子路成大賢。亦可引作魔考中定品位之參考焉。總之，吾們既修真道，必受魔考。那是一定之理。今將魔考種類，在下一題裡再作分析，以供諸位玩索之。

From the differences in what each of these disciples said, we may know that their attainments and achievements were bound to differ as well. In the end Confucius became the Supreme Sage, and Yan Hui the Sage of Return; Zigong became one of the Ten Wise Disciples, and Zilu a Great Worthy.8 This too may be taken as a guide to how rank is fixed within the demonic trials. In sum: since we cultivate the true Dao, we must undergo the demonic trials — that is a settled principle. In the section that follows, I will set out the several kinds of demonic trials, for you all to turn over and ponder.
十四

如何應付魔考

How to Meet the Demonic Trials
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（一）內考：凡以生瘡害病，久纏不解、蟲傷狗咬、跌打驚痛、水火之災、盜賊之患等而言，大小都有因果。欲求消解，就是「感之以誠」。因為德可感天，誠能動神。只要你抱定真心，信賴　上帝。所謂「皇天無親，惟德是輔」，無形中自然撥機化除矣。

(1) Inner trials. Under this head fall afflictions such as festering sores and lingering sickness that will not be shaken off, wounds from insects and bites from dogs, falls and blows and sudden frights, the disasters of flood and fire, and the ravages of thieves and bandits — all of them, great and small alike, arising from cause and effect. To have them dissolved, the way is to ‘move them by sincerity.’ For virtue can move Heaven, and sincerity can stir the divine; you need only hold fast to a genuine heart and put your trust in the Lord on High. As it is said, ‘August Heaven has no kin; it succors only the virtuous’1 — and then, all unseen, the hidden spring turns of itself, and the affliction is dissolved away.

（二）外考：即親友毀謗、鄰里譏笑、保甲哃嚇、官府不容，以及武力干涉等情。應付方法，就是信之以理。既明真理，即將世欲看淡，生死由命，何懼之由。故程子修道，當時目之為偽道，呼之為黨人，奏之於朝，刻之於石，茫茫大地，幾無托足之處。朱子學道，當時目之為妄，呼之為妖，信之犯禁，避之者無罪，毀之者有功，排之者有賞，其身削職罰祿，徙其徒於邊役。陽明先生平治禍亂，有功不賞，居蕭寺談禪，若不知其事者。蔡元定父子因信朱子之學，發配從軍，不避艱險，驛居傳道，都是認清真理，看淡世俗，所以不怕任何考魔也。

(2) Outer trials. These are such things as slander from kin and friends, ridicule from neighbors, threats from the village wardens, rejection by the authorities, and interference by armed force. The way to meet them is to answer with faith grounded in principle. Once you have understood the Truth, you will hold the world’s desires lightly, knowing that life and death rest with destiny — so where is the cause for fear? Thus when Master Cheng cultivated the Dao, the men of his day branded it a false Way and called its followers a faction; they denounced them at court and carved their names in stone, until in all the vast earth there was scarcely a place to set one’s foot. When Master Zhu pursued his learning, the men of that day branded it absurd and called it sorcery: to believe in it was to break the law, to shun it was no crime, to defame it was counted a merit, and to attack it won a reward. His own person was stripped of office and cut off from his salary, and his disciples were banished to labor on the frontier. Master Wang Yangming put down rebellion and disorder, yet his merit went unrewarded; he lodged in a mountain monastery discoursing on Chan, as though he knew nothing of the whole affair. Cai Yuanding and his son, for their faith in Master Zhu’s learning, were sentenced to penal exile and conscription; yet, shrinking from no hardship or peril, they lodged at the post-stations and there transmitted the Dao. In every case these men clearly discerned the Truth and held the world lightly, and so they feared no trial or demon whatsoever.2

（三）氣考：就是有恩不報，倒反為仇，使你遭不白之冤，怒氣填胸，火性發作。如遇此考，要有寬容大量的胸襟去應付。他叫你生氣，偏不生氣。祖師說過：「有人打老拙，老拙先倒了；有人罵老拙，老拙嘻嘻笑。涎吐我臉上，任他自乾了。我亦省力氣，他亦免煩惱。」耶穌說：「有人打你右臉，連左臉也轉過來由他打。有人想拿你的裡衣，連外衣也由他拿去。強逼你走一里路，你就同他走二里。」所以應該效法祖師和耶穌説的話去實行。

(3) Temper trials. These come when a kindness is repaid with enmity, when you are made to bear an injustice you never earned, so that anger fills your breast and the fire of your nature flares up. Should you meet with such a trial, you must answer it with a broad and forbearing heart: he means to make you angry, and you, contrary to his design, are simply not angry. The Patriarch once said: ‘If a man strikes this old fool, the old fool falls straight down; if a man curses this old fool, the old fool only laughs and laughs. Should he spit upon my face, I let it dry of itself; so I am spared the exertion, and he is spared his vexation.’3 And Jesus said: ‘If anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other to him as well; if anyone would take your inner garment, let him have your cloak too; and whoever forces you to go one mile, go with him two.’4 We should therefore take the words of the Patriarch and of Jesus for our model, and put them into practice.

（四）奇考：凡頃家敗產，夫妻離散，兒女死亡，都屬奇考。我們修道，不識此考，容易墜落。但如何應付呢？就是「守理認命」。要知房產田地皆屬於假；夫妻兒女，終久離散。古詩云：「天也空，地也空，人生渺茫在其中。日也空，月也空，東昇西墜為誰功？金也空，銀也空，死後何曾在手中？田也空，地也空，換了多少主人翁？妻也空，子也空，黃泉路上不相逢。」所以人之一生得失榮枯，皆由命運而定，不可強求，亦不可辭。知此則無所謂考矣！

(4) Extraordinary trials. The ruin of one’s house and fortune, the parting of husband and wife, the death of one’s children — all belong to the extraordinary trials. We who cultivate the Dao, if we fail to recognize this trial for what it is, easily fall away. How, then, are we to meet it? By ‘holding to principle and accepting our lot.’ Know that houses and lands, fields and estates, all belong to the false, and that husband and wife, sons and daughters, must in the end be parted. As the old poem says: ‘Heaven is empty, earth is empty, and the life of man a dim, uncertain thing between them. The sun is empty, the moon is empty; they rise in the east and set in the west — for whose sake do they toil? Gold is empty, silver is empty; once we are dead, what of it was ever in our hands? The field is empty, the land is empty; how many masters has it passed between? Wife is empty, child is empty; on the road to the Yellow Springs we shall not meet.’5 And so the gains and losses, the flourishing and the withering of a man’s whole life are all fixed by his destiny: they can be neither forced nor declined. Know this, and there is no such thing as a trial at all!

（五）順考：可分聖、凡兩面來說。凡者，妻恩子愛推不開，打不破。聲色貨利，隨聲肆慾，使你迷而妄返。聖者，前人獎勵、後學附和，使你驕傲放肆，趾高氣揚。不知不覺中，將道心放棄。若遇此考，應速覺猛醒，「順來逆受」。凡者，要臨淵止步，懸崖勒馬，知前途可畏，抱道速修。聖者，要反躬自問，所受獎勵與恭維，是否有愧？自然順考可消解矣。

(5) Favorable trials. These may be spoken of on two sides, the mundane and the sacred. On the mundane side: the love of wife and child that cannot be pushed aside or broken through; and the sounds and sights, the goods and gains of the world — for as you follow their tune and give rein to desire, they lead you astray and leave you no way back. On the sacred side: the praise of your elders and the assent of your juniors, which puff you up into pride and license, until you strut with your chin held high and, all unaware, let the heart-of-the-Dao slip away. Should you meet with this trial, you must awaken swiftly and rouse yourself — ‘receive the favorable as though it were adverse.’ On the mundane side, halt at the brink of the abyss and rein in your horse at the cliff’s edge; know that the road ahead is to be feared, and embrace the Dao and cultivate without delay. On the sacred side, turn inward and question yourself: this praise and flattery you have received — is there not cause for shame in it? Then, of itself, the favorable trial will be dissolved.

（六）逆考：亦可分聖凡兩面來說。凡者，父母妻子怨恨，環境艱難，衣食困苦，失志背運，憂鬱身心。聖者，前人無情，後學卑視，致使你灰心喪氣，無所適從。遇此考場，應「逆來順受」。凡者，安分守命，抱定道心。須知玉碎不失其白，竹焚不毀其節。聖者，修無為之道，行無為之功，以報恩了愿為前提。處處反求諸己，對承上啟下，每覺有不及的地方。

(6) Adverse trials. These too may be spoken of on the two sides, the sacred and the mundane. On the mundane side: parents, wife, and children who bear you resentment; hard circumstances; want of food and clothing; the loss of heart and the turning of fortune; body and mind sunk in melancholy. On the sacred side: elders without warmth for you, and juniors who look down on you, so that you grow disheartened and dispirited, not knowing where to turn. When you meet with this trial-ground, you must ‘receive the adverse as though it were favorable.’ On the mundane side, keep to your station and accept your lot, holding fast to the heart-of-the-Dao; know that jade, though shattered, does not lose its whiteness, and bamboo, though burned, does not lose its jointed integrity. On the sacred side, cultivate the Dao of non-action and perform the merit of non-action, taking the repayment of grace and the fulfilling of vows as your first aim; at every turn seek the fault within yourself, and in receiving from those above and handing on to those below, feel always that there is somewhere you have fallen short.

（七）顛倒考：三期末劫，修練真道原係了脫生死，斷滅因果。只因一般修道之士，根基緣份，冤欠不同，故魔考有異。或先貧後富，得意洋洋，棄絕道念；或先富後貧，憂鬱牢騷，抱怨退志。若遇是考，應當素位而行，抱定真志，念念不忘，時刻常存。造次必於是，顛沛必於是。

(7) Reversal trials. In the End Times of the Third Period, the cultivation of the true Dao is meant, from the first, for release from birth-and-death and the severing of cause-and-effect. It is only because cultivators differ from one another in their root-foundation, their karmic affinities, and their grievance-debts, that the demonic trials they meet differ as well. One man is poor first and rich after, and grows so pleased with himself that he casts off every thought of the Dao; another is rich first and poor after, and sinks into gloom and grumbling, full of complaint, his resolve in retreat. Should you meet with this trial, you must ‘act according to your station,’6 holding fast to a true resolve — unforgotten in thought after thought, present at every hour: in moments of haste cleaving to it, in times of stumbling and peril cleaving to it still.7

（八）道考：分內外兩種。內考是本道同仁，小者言行不顧，違仁失義，彼此忿恨，互起摩擦；大者心生陰險，分枝別派，爭道盤，奪天命。外考係三十六左道，七十二旁門，種種法術，無奇不有，使你目花神亂，難辨真偽。稍有貪妄，恐怕要登舟尋舟，騎驢覓驢。若遇此考，必須無貪無妄。故道云：「清靜無為。」儒云：「無聲無臭。」佛云：「若以色見我，以音聲求我，是人行邪道，不能見如來。」又云：「凡所有象，皆是虛妄，一切有為法，如夢幻泡影，如露亦如電。應作如是觀。」所以吾們修道，應認清道考。

(8) Trials of the Way. These are of two kinds, inner and outer. The inner trials arise among our own fellows in the Dao. In their lesser form, speech and conduct grow heedless of one another, benevolence is transgressed and righteousness lost, and resentment and friction spring up between them; in their graver form, the heart breeds treachery, branches and factions split off, and men contend for the domain of the Dao and grasp after the Heavenly Mandate. The outer trials are the thirty-six heterodox ways and the seventy-two side-doors, with all their arts and conjurings — nothing so strange but it is found among them — dazzling your eyes and confounding your spirit, so that true and false are hard to tell apart. With the least greed or delusion, you may find yourself boarding the boat to look for the boat, or riding the donkey to search for the donkey. Should you meet with this trial, you must be without greed and without delusion. Thus the Daoist teaching says, ‘Be pure, still, and without contrivance’;8 the Confucian says, ‘neither sound nor scent’;9 and the Buddhist says, ‘Whoever sees me in form, or seeks me through sound, treads a false path and cannot see the Tathāgata,’10 and again, ‘All that has form is illusory and false,’ and ‘All conditioned things are as a dream, an illusion, a bubble, a shadow; as the dew, and as the lightning — thus should they be contemplated.’11 And so we who cultivate the Dao must recognize the trials of the Way for what they are.

以上各種考魔，你們任何人若遇到時，千萬要想想院長所說的話。考者是明考，魔者暗考。考易識；魔不易識。總之不外「喜怒愛憎」四個字。凡不中節，皆入魔境矣。所以修道要識透魔相。否則不防魔禦魔，反而助魔成魔，多麼可怕！

Whichever of you should meet with any of these several trials, by all means call to mind the words the Director has spoken. The ‘trial’ is a testing conducted in the open; the ‘demon’ is a testing conducted in the dark. The open testing is easy to know; the hidden one is not. In sum, it all comes down to no more than four words — joy, anger, love, and hate. Whenever these fail to keep their due measure,12 one has entered the realm of the demon. And so, in cultivating the Dao, one must see clear through the demon’s disguises. Otherwise, far from warding off the demon and repelling it, you will aid the demon and become a demon yourself — how fearful a thing that is!

像如來佛前世為忍辱時，受哥利王分身之辱。他認為正是我的恩人，並助他早早成道。說我來世降生時，一定渡你。後來如來成道，渡弟子阿難，即是哥利王後身。又如岳武穆風波亭遇難時，恐子弟後叛，召至刑場，同歸於盡，還感謝秦檜使其成為忠良。

Consider how the Tathāgata Buddha, in a former life when he practiced forbearance, suffered the humiliation of having his body cut apart by King Kalinga. He held the king to be his very benefactor, and vowed to help him attain the Dao all the sooner, saying, ‘When I am born again in a life to come, I will surely deliver you.’ And later, when the Tathāgata attained the Way, the disciple he delivered — Ānanda — was none other than the later incarnation of King Kalinga.13 Or consider Yue Wumu: when he met his doom at the Wind-and-Wave Pavilion, he feared that his sons and followers might afterward rise in revolt, and so summoned them to the execution ground to perish together with him — even giving thanks to Qin Hui for making of him a loyal and faithful man.14

由此而知，古來秉忠孝節義，多是色身頂劫，靈性歸天。何況吾們修天道呢？雖然如此，恐一般少見多怪者，難免其流言謗語，譏剌詆評。故老子云：「上士聞道，勤而行之；中士聞道，若存若亡；下士聞道，則大笑之。」莊周曰：「籬燕不知鴻鵠之志，夏蟲不可語冰，井蛙不信天大。」宋王曰：「其曲彌高，其和彌寡。」孔子曰：「德修謗興，道高毀來。」由此觀之，有道有魔，一定之理。吾儕修道必須警惕勉勵，抱無畏無為之精神，存不知不慍之肚量。方不致受魔考包圍矣。

From this we may know that those who, in ages past, upheld loyalty and filial devotion, integrity and righteousness, for the most part let the body of flesh bear the brunt of the catastrophe while the spiritual nature returned to Heaven. How much more must this be so for us, who cultivate the Heavenly Way? And yet, for all this, it is to be feared that the common sort — who, having seen little, marvel at much — will scarcely refrain from their rumors and slanders, their mockery and disparagement. Thus Laozi says: ‘When the highest sort hear of the Dao, they diligently practice it; when the middling sort hear of the Dao, they half keep it and half let it go; when the lowest sort hear of the Dao, they laugh aloud at it.’15 Zhuang Zhou says: ‘The fence-sparrow knows nothing of the swan’s high aim; with the summer insect one cannot speak of ice; the frog in the well will not believe the sky is vast.’16 The King of Song says: ‘The loftier the melody, the fewer can join in its harmony.’17 Confucius says: ‘As virtue is cultivated, slander springs up; as the Dao grows lofty, defamation comes.’18 Seen in this light, that where there is the Dao there is the demon is a settled principle. We who cultivate the Dao must be watchful and spur ourselves on, embracing a spirit of fearlessness and non-action, and keeping within us the breadth of heart that feels no resentment though it goes unrecognized19 — and only so shall we escape being besieged by the demonic trials.
十五

降伏身心

Subduing Body and Mind
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心者，人身萬靈之主宰。身者，人生作事之具。身之一動，受心之操持；心之發揮，賴身之形成。佛云：「萬法由心生，萬法由心滅。」

The mind is the sovereign master of all the numinous powers within the human person; the body is the instrument by which a person carries out his affairs. Every movement of the body is directed and held in check by the mind, and every expression of the mind depends upon the body to take its form. The Buddha said: ‘All dharmas arise from the mind, and all dharmas perish from the mind.’1

心之動靜，實是靈妙莫測。但不外邪、正兩念。正，是合於理；邪，是流於慾。世人常失其正，而流於邪；昧於理，而惑於慾。邪慾的害人，真正可怕極了。佛家有「拴心猿，鎖意馬。」「掃三心，飛四相。」儒家有「三省其身，四勿其心。」都是使人棄邪歸正，制慾返理的證明。

The stirrings and stillnesses of the mind are subtle beyond all fathoming; yet they come down to nothing more than two kinds of thought — the errant and the upright. The upright is what accords with principle; the errant is what slides into desire. People of the world constantly lose their uprightness and slide into error, growing blind to principle and led astray by desire. The harm that errant desire does to a person is fearful in the extreme. The Buddhists speak of ‘tethering the monkey of the mind and chaining the horse of the will,’ and of ‘sweeping away the three minds and casting off the four marks’; the Confucians speak of ‘examining oneself on three points and guarding the mind with four prohibitions.’ All of these bear witness to the effort to turn people from error back to uprightness, to curb desire and return to principle.

今將三心四相、三省四勿，簡而喻之，以釋降伏身心之本意：

Let me now set out the three minds and four marks, and the three points of self-examination and the four prohibitions, in simple illustration, so as to lay bare what it truly means to subdue body and mind:

三心乃過去、未來、現在的三種心，不要存他。四相者，著於形，謂之相。

The three minds are the three kinds of mind — those of the past, the future, and the present — and one must not harbor them. As for the four marks: to become fixated upon outward form is what is called a ‘mark.’2

（一）凡為自己衣食計，及兒女計，終日營營，溷於名利，逐浪忘返，縛而不解者，謂之我相。

(1) To scheme all day long for one’s own food and clothing, and for one’s children; to toil and bustle without cease, wallowing in fame and gain, chasing the waves and forgetting to turn back, bound fast and never freed — this is called the mark of self.

（二）見人勢力，攀望不已；見人萎弱，厭惡不已。嫉人之有，吝人之求，謂之人相。

(2) At the sight of another’s power and influence, to fawn and covet without end; at the sight of another’s frailty, to loathe and despise without end; to envy what others have, and to begrudge what others ask — this is called the mark of a person.

（三）色、受、想、行，希望茍求，言正行邪，口善心惡，謂之眾生相。

(3) To be governed by form, sensation, perception, and volition; to harbor craving and grasp after gain; to speak what is upright while acting perversely, and to be fair of mouth but evil of heart — this is called the mark of sentient beings.

（四）跪禱拜祈，而求現在福報。燒符煉丹，冀望長生不老，謂之壽者相。

(4) To kneel in prayer and bow in supplication merely to seek blessings and rewards in the present life; to burn talismans and refine elixirs in the hope of undying long life — this is called the mark of a life-span.

三省者：

The three points of self-examination are:

（一）「為人謀而不忠乎？」按修道說，就是代天宣化，拯救眾生，你盡到責任了嗎？

(1) ‘In planning on others’ behalf, have I failed to be faithful?’3 In terms of cultivation, this means: to proclaim and spread Heaven’s teaching in Heaven’s stead, and to rescue all beings — have you fulfilled your responsibility?

（二）「與朋友交而不信乎？」就是承上啟下，一言一動，自心有無欺妄？你守信了嗎？

(2) ‘In dealings with friends, have I failed to be true?’ This means: in carrying on from those above and handing down to those below, in every word and every act — has your own heart harbored any deceit or falsehood? Have you kept faith?

（三）「傳不習乎？」就是師傳心法，和老師素日指示你的言語、諸天仙佛批的訓示，以及各位前賢（原文作前人）給你講的話，你參悟了嗎？你實行了嗎？

(3) ‘Have I failed to practice what was transmitted to me?’ This refers to the mind-dharma transmitted by the master, the words the Holy Teacher instructs you with day by day, the teachings inscribed by the buddhas and immortals of all the heavens, and the words the various worthy seniors (the original text here reads ‘the Elders’) have spoken to you — have you contemplated and awakened to them? Have you put them into practice?

四勿者：

The four prohibitions are:

（一）「非禮勿視。」就是吾們既修真道，須認真理，將一切色相都看破他。心意常存玄關之內，莫使外馳。自然不受損害了。

(1) ‘Look not upon what is contrary to propriety.’4 This means: since we cultivate the true Dao, we must recognize the true principle and see through all forms and appearances. Let mind and intent abide ever within the Mysterious Pass, and never let them race outward — then of themselves they take no harm.

（二）「非禮勿言。」就是莫談別人是非好壞，自然不擔口過了。

(2) ‘Speak not what is contrary to propriety.’ This means: do not discuss the right and wrong, the good and bad, of others — then of yourself you incur no fault of the mouth.

（三）「非禮勿聽。」就是莫要輕聽人語，心生反感。一念之差，便有險象叢生。

(3) ‘Listen not to what is contrary to propriety.’ This means: do not lightly heed the words of others and let aversion arise in your heart — for by a single errant thought, perils spring up in a throng.

（四）「非禮勿動。」就是人之作為，不要輕舉妄動。必須自心加以檢點，是否合禮，而免錯過身擔。

(4) ‘Move not in a way contrary to propriety.’ This means: in whatever a person does, do not act rashly or recklessly. One must hold one’s own heart to account — whether the act accords with propriety — and so avoid committing a fault that one must then bear.

以上各種比喻，均是戒吾修道者，要時時降伏身心。因人既落後天，到處受色慾之包圍，身心一動，非正即偏。偏則沈溺流連，前途堪虞。心之為害尤其可怕。因他時起幻想，一有外感，最易動盪。所以佛云：「魔由心生，考由自招。」若不降伏身心，制其亂源，修道豈能成功？

All the illustrations above are meant to admonish us cultivators to subdue body and mind at every moment. For once a person has fallen into the acquired realm, he is surrounded on every side by sensual desire; and the instant body and mind stir, it is either upright or aslant. When it goes aslant, one is drowned and lingers there, and the road ahead is imperiled. The harm the mind can do is more fearful than all else, for it forever conjures up illusions, and at the least outward provocation it is most easily set churning. Therefore the Buddha said: ‘Demons arise from the mind, and trials are summoned by oneself.’5 If we do not subdue body and mind and stem the wellspring of disorder, how could the cultivation of the Dao ever succeed?
十六

謹言慎行

Guarded in Speech, Careful in Conduct
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謹言者，乃不輕於言也。慎行者，乃行動檢點也。因人之言語行動，每宜發而中節。若不中節，就有歧事發生。小者自身名譽糟糕，受人誣唾排斥；大者牽掣大眾，招來種種魔考，受辱受謗。

To be guarded in speech means not to speak lightly; to be careful in conduct means to keep one's actions in check. A person's words and deeds should each issue in due measure, for where they miss that measure, things go awry. At the least, one's own good name is ruined, and one meets with slander, contempt, and rejection; at the worst, one drags the whole community down as well, drawing on all manner of demonic trials and bringing insult and abuse upon oneself.

所以孔子戒人謹言曰：「君子欲訥於言。」又曰：「言未及之而言，謂之躁；言及之而不言，謂之隱；未見顏色而言，謂之瞽。」又曰：「可與言而不與之言，失人；不可與言而與之言，失言。」子貢亦曰：「一言以為知，一言以為不知。言不可不慎也。」慎行就是防非改過，莫要粗心大意，發生意外。

Thus Confucius warned people to be guarded in speech. He said: 'The gentleman wishes to be slow to speak.'1 And again: 'To speak when it is not yet one's turn to speak is called rashness; not to speak when it is one's turn is called concealment; to speak without first reading the other's face is called blindness.'2 And again: 'When a man is worth speaking with and you do not speak with him, you lose the man; when a man is not worth speaking with and you do speak with him, you waste your words.'3 Zigong too said: 'By a single word a man is judged wise, and by a single word judged foolish; a word must never be uttered without care.'4 To be careful in conduct is just this: to guard against wrong and mend one's faults, and never to be careless and so bring on mishap.

總之，「謹言慎行」就是叫人言語舉動，戒慎恐懼，慎微、慎獨，念念莫離的意思。故吾們修道，一言一行，於道有益，於道有補者，舉之。否則戒之。

In sum, to be 'guarded in speech and careful in conduct' means simply this: that in word and deed a person be cautious and reverent,5 careful in the smallest things and watchful even when alone, never departing from this for a single thought. And so, in cultivating the Dao, whatever word or deed benefits the Dao and furthers it — let it be done; and whatever does not — let it be set aside.
十七

立愿了愿

Making Vows and Fulfilling Them
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愿者，原心也。凡是良心發現，天性中自然生成的誠懇進取心，就是「愿」。

A vow is the heart in its very origin. When the conscience awakens within one's Heaven-given nature, whatever earnest, striving intention then arises of itself — that is a 'vow.'

我們修道，對於立愿之事，都很明瞭。大愿一立，馬上先天註冊，使吾們玄祖高昇，冤欠遠遁。剛才給你們道喜，就是這種意思。

We who cultivate the Dao all understand the making of vows quite well. The moment a great vow is made, one's name is at once entered in the primordial record; our ancestors are raised on high, and our karmic debts flee far away. This is the very thing I meant when I offered you my congratulations just now.

既然　上天對吾們如此慈悲，我們就該立愿了愿，實地進行。否則，天時一到，　上天考真驗實，不但不能達到極樂，定累玄祖同墜苦海。為什麼呢？只因　上天雖慈，決不佑庇陽奉陰違，似是而非之人。所以求道時立囑詞上，早就明白告訴我們說：「立愿不了，難把鄉還。」由此觀之，我們修道對立愿了愿一題，切要看重，不可輕視。

Since Heaven has shown us so great a compassion, we ought to make our vows and then fulfill them, carrying them out in solid earnest. Otherwise, once Heaven's appointed time arrives and Heaven tests what is true and proves what is real, not only shall we fail to reach the supreme bliss — we shall surely drag our ancestors down with us into the sea of suffering. And why? Only because Heaven, compassionate though it is, will never shelter those who comply in the open and defy in secret, who seem right but are false. This is why, at the receiving of the Dao, the words of the pledge told us plainly from the very first: 'If a vow is made but not fulfilled, it will be hard to return home.'1 Seen in this light, we who cultivate the Dao must hold the making and fulfilling of vows in the greatest seriousness, and never treat it lightly.
十八

懺悔改過

Repentance and the Mending of Faults
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懺者，陳露也。悔者，悔改也。懺悔改過，就是自己陳訴已往的罪過，自新未來的行為，所以懺悔是我們修道人第一要素。因為素日對人處事接物，非偏即倚，造下種種罪惡，若不實心懺悔改過，怎麼成道呢？諺云：「上天沒有帶罪的仙佛，人間沒有負罪的官吏。」也就是此意。

To confess is to lay bare; to repent is to turn and mend. 'Repentance and the mending of faults' means to disclose for oneself the sins and transgressions of one's past, and to make one's conduct new in the days to come. Repentance, then, is the foremost essential for us who cultivate the Dao. For in the ordinary course of our dealings — with people, with affairs, and with things — we are forever erring to the one side or the other, and so lay up sins and evils of every kind; and if we do not repent and mend our faults with a sincere heart, how shall we ever attain the Dao? As the proverb has it: 'In Heaven above there are no sin-laden immortals or buddhas; on earth below there are no crime-bearing officials.' This is exactly what it means.

故今生懺悔，乃為三期末劫，自己靈性出苦而懺悔，為養成潔白完人而懺悔，為玄祖超生而懺悔。懺悔之真義，希望各位萬勿疏忽。每天我們所讀的懺悔文上：「彌勒祖師，妙法無邊，護庇眾生，懺悔佛前，改過自新，同註天盤。」也是說吾們修道，茍不懺悔日新，總難達到圓滿之期望。

Thus our repentance in this present life, made in the End Times of the Third Period, is a repentance that our own spiritual nature may come forth from suffering; a repentance that we may be formed into pure and spotless, whole persons; a repentance that our ancestors may be delivered to a higher birth.1 Its true meaning is something I pray none of you will make light of. In the Repentance Text we recite each day, it is written: 'Patriarch Maitreya, boundless in wondrous Dharma, shelters and shields all living beings; repenting before the Buddha, mending our faults and making ourselves new, together may we be enrolled upon the Heavenly Register.'2 This too tells us that, in cultivating the Dao, if we do not repent and renew ourselves day by day, we shall find it hard indeed to reach the longed-for day of perfect completion.
十九

一念嗔心起百萬障門開

One Thought of Anger, and a Million Gates of Obstruction Swing Open
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嗔為三毒之一，凡一切念念不平，存計較之心者，均是嗔心。我們修道，本性是活潑自然無為的。所以道與天時，隨機轉變；人性光圓洒沱，亦應隨機轉變，切莫稍遇不適心，即隨境遷，而一念嗔心，引入陰魔矣！

Anger is one of the three poisons.1 Whenever thought after thought is aggrieved, and one harbors a calculating, contentious heart — all of this is the heart of anger. In our cultivation of the Dao, our original nature is lively, natural, and free of contrivance. And so, just as the Dao and the seasons of Heaven shift and turn as circumstances require, our human nature — luminous, whole, and unfettered — should shift and turn with them in the same way. Never let it happen that, at the least brush with something not to your liking, you drift along with your surroundings, so that a single angry thought draws you in among the dark demons!

像從前邱祖修道，初遇相士，說他面相最惡，將來定主餓死。但後來邱祖功行圓滿，未曾餓死，並且成了神仙。他偶而嗔心一動，高駕雲頭，尋相士質問沒有餓死之原因。經相士謂其陰隲高大，面相已轉凶為吉，才覺悟乃是自己嗔心動了。馬上靜心息念，身入山中，打坐參禪。但他嗔心既生，雖然覺悟得快，而天考不貸，終難了事，招來了種種陰魔，攪亂了他的身心。幸邱祖早識此意，把握牢固，未曾動搖。不然一念之差，前功盡棄，永墜沉淪。

Take, from former times, Patriarch Qiu's cultivation of the Dao.2 When he first met a physiognomist, he was told that his features were most ill-omened, and that he was surely destined to starve to death. Yet in the end Patriarch Qiu brought his merit and practice to fulfillment; he did not starve, but indeed became an immortal. Once, on a sudden stirring of anger, he rode high upon the clouds to seek out the physiognomist and demand why, after all, he had not starved. The physiognomist told him that his hidden virtue had grown great and lofty, so that his features had already turned from ill-omened to auspicious — and only then did Patriarch Qiu realize that his own angry heart had stirred. At once he stilled his mind and quieted his thoughts, withdrew into the mountains, and sat in meditation and Chan contemplation. But once his anger had arisen, quick though he was to awaken to it, the trials of Heaven granted no reprieve. The matter could not be so easily put to rest: it drew upon him all manner of dark demons, and threw his body and mind into turmoil. Happily, Patriarch Qiu had recognized what was afoot early, held his ground firmly, and never wavered. Otherwise, by a single errant thought, all his former merit would have been cast away, and he would have sunk forever into perdition.

所以嗔心為害，實在可怕。希望大眾警之、戒之！

Thus the harm wrought by the heart of anger is fearful indeed. May you all be watchful of it and guard against it!
二十

真道真考見真心

The True Dao, True Trials, and the Revealing of the True Heart
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這一題，是末尾一題。兩天來院長和你們講的題、談的話，述古論今。都是闡明道的寶貴、道的真切，使你們各行各功，各了各愿。但進修途中，冤欠、魔考是絕對不能免的。因為修的真道，必受 上天的真考。有真考方見真心。且累世冤人家的、欠人家的，豈能不還麼？

This topic is the last of all. Over these two days, the topics the Director has expounded to you and the words he has spoken — drawing on the ancients, speaking to the present — have all been to make plain how precious the Dao is, and how utterly genuine, so that each of you may perform his own meritorious work and fulfill his own vows. But along the road of cultivation, karmic debts and demonic trials simply cannot be avoided. For if what one cultivates is the true Dao, one must undergo the true trials of Heaven above; and only through true trials is the true heart revealed. When, life after life, one has wronged others and run into debt with them, how could these things go unrepaid?

可見真考之中， 上天暗中給你們消了罪孽冤欠。所以遇著魔考，正是 上天慈悲你，玉成你。切要明白此意。更可說這道題，是吾臨別一句知心話，使你心有成見，不致日後有魔考之束縛。

From this we may see that in the very midst of the true trials, Heaven above is secretly dissolving your sins and karmic debts for you. And so, when you meet with a demonic trial, it is precisely Heaven above taking pity on you and bringing you to perfection.1 Be sure to grasp this well. More than that, let this topic stand as one heartfelt word of farewell from me — so that your heart may hold a settled conviction, and in the days to come you will not be bound by the demonic trials.

院長復對大眾諄諄告誡，懇摯勉勵，並賜「思母勉進曲」 (調寄：落花流水) 以作留念。

The Director then earnestly admonished the assembly once more, exhorting them with heartfelt sincerity, and bestowed on them the 'Song of Longing for the Mother, Urging Us Onward' (to the tune 'Falling Flowers, Flowing Water') as a keepsake.
思母勉進曲調寄：落花流水

「好時候，像水一般不斷的流，收圓弗久，將涅槃兮誰亦不能留。末劫臨頭，可惜那九六迷子孽海流。想起了憫世的慈母，苦海舟，眾生救，暮暮朝朝，朝朝暮暮，總是心兒憂。眉兒皺，淚兒流，九六不得救，怎算把圓收。諸位弟妹惺呀！追隨咱母親這樣進呀！到處去開荒把種下，趕快幫咱那慈悲的媽媽，妹呀！弟呀！記住我的話呀！」

This good hour, like water, flows on and never stays; the Ingathering is not far off — when nirvana comes, no one can be held back. The final catastrophe is upon us; alas, the ninety-six lost children2 drift on the sea of karmic sin. I think of the compassionate Mother who grieves for the world3 — the ferry upon the sea of suffering, the rescue of all beings. Dusk after dusk, dawn after dawn — dawn after dawn, dusk after dusk — the compassionate Mother's heart is forever heavy with care, the brow drawn tight, the tears let fall: if the ninety-six are not saved, how shall the Ingathering be counted complete? All you younger brothers and sisters — awaken! Follow our Mother, and press onward just so! Go out to every place, break open the fallow ground and sow the seed; make haste to help our compassionate Mother. O sisters! O brothers! Remember my words!

活佛師尊說：

The Holy Teacher, our Patriarch, said:

「明理好修道」、「理念正確倒不了」。修辦路上要常保靈明的赤子本心，才能常生智慧，破解無明，任考不倒。道義瞭解的夠明夠清，根基就穩，道行就深，風吹考來都不足以動搖本心，道場才辦得可長可久。

'Understand the principle, and the cultivation of the Dao goes well'; 'hold a right and sound conviction, and you cannot be toppled.' On the road of cultivating and serving, one must always keep the luminous, pure heart of a newborn child4, for only so can wisdom continually arise, ignorance be broken through, and every trial be met without falling. Once one's grasp of the Dao's meaning is clear and thorough, the foundation stands firm and one's practice of the Dao runs deep; then no wind that blows and no trial that comes is enough to shake the original heart — and only then can the work of the temple be carried on, enduring and long.