Your eyes are deceived. All that you see is like a ball bounced off a wall to your eyes. The stick looks bent because two balls are being bounced back. One from the water, one from the air.
Master, I still don't see.
Look closer, you may see things better, and you may see things you've never seen before. But the biggest puzzle you should solve is to let other people see you.
X ooo X ooo X
Master, should I not destroy the spider's web?
Why?
Because it imprisons living things and robs them of their freedom.
But is not the spider also trapped within its own web?
Yes, Master, but it still traps living things, and it, I cannot kill.
Yet, does not the fly have wings and is able to choose its own path?
But still, is not the fly in danger of being trapped? and others, and still more others?
The fly who enters danger unawares is in no danger, but the spider who cannot leave the web.
X ooo X ooo X
Master, these things which we are taught...I cannot do them.
You are finding excersises too difficult?
No Master, too cruel.
And to be killed, what is that?
I must learn the excersises to defend myself.
Then learn first how to live, then second, how not to kill; learn third, how to live with death; learn fourth, how to die.
X ooo X ooo X
Whar are you doing?
Painting a branch of a tree.
Is not painting the joyful reaching out of a man so filled with beauty that there is not room enough for him to contain it?
Master, I do not know if I should speak of what it is that troubles me. I have seen her. Her hair...is soft and rich. Her voice...liquid. Her eyes...bewitch me. My sleep is filled with listless dreams. My wakefullness...with longings. How shall I know if this is love?
What do you see?
Two glasses...joined together...one filled with sand.
Only one?
The other is empty.
Look! (He turns the hour glass over.) To know love, be like a running brook, though deaf, yet sings its melody for others to hear. Feel the pain of too much tenderness. Await the dawn with a winged heart, and give thanks for another day of loving. Empty yourself, and yet be filled. An old man tells you...this is how to know love.
X ooo X ooo X
What tells you the time?
The arm of the sundial.
But what of the sun?
Yes, the sun; both help us. They tell us the time.
Yet, does not the sundial standing in the way of the sun defeat its light?
Master, I do not understand. Like many things you teach me, it is a contradiction.
Shoot the arrow.
(So he does.)
Which brings it to its target? the bow or the arrow? Launched,
the arrow has no choice but to seek its target, yet, without the arrow, the bow is an empty promise of flight.
Still, I do not understand.
When you must choose between one good or another, or one evil and another, remember this: if men would contend with you, seek not their death, but choose your own life.