Great Throughts Treasury

"Hate is not conquered by hate; hate is conquered by love. This is law eternal."

"Just as rain breaks not through a well-thatched house, passion breaks not through a well-guarded mind."

"Friendships are broken off by envy and selfishness. "

"Blessings enlighten the whole world. "

"First of all there will appear to you, swifter than lightning, the luminous splendor of the colorless light of Emptiness, and that will surround you on all sides. ...Try to submerge yourself in that light, giving up all belief in a separate self, all attachment to your illusory ego."

"The judgment: You are now before Yama, King of the Dead. In vain will you try to...deny or conceal the evil deeds you have done. ... the mirror in which Yama seems to read your past is your own memory, and also his judgment is your own. It is you yourself who pronounce your own judgment."

"The best weapon is wisdom. "

"The most precious treasure is virtue."

"All that is comes from the mind; it is based on the mind, it is fashioned by the mind."

"Avoid what is evil; do what is good; purify the mind - this is the teaching of the Awakened One."

"The Four Dhamma Summaries - 1. The world is swept away. It does not endure. 2. The world offers no shelter. There is no one in charge. 3. The world has nothing of its own. One has to pass on leaving everything behind. 4. The world is insufficient, insatiable, a slave to craving."

"The Blessed One said, "When touched with a feeling of pain, the uninstructed run-of-the-mill person sorrows, grieves, & laments, beats his breast, becomes distraught. So he feels two pains, physical & mental. Just as if they were to shoot a man with an arrow and, right afterward, were to shoot him with another one, so that he would feel the pains of two arrows; in the same way, when touched with a feeling of pain, the uninstructed run-of-the-mill person sorrows, grieves, & laments, beats his breast, becomes distraught. So he feels two pains, physical & mental."

"I don't envision a single thing that -- when untamed, unguarded, unprotected, unrestrained -- leads to such great harm as the mind. The mind -- when untamed, unguarded, unprotected, unrestrained -- leads to great harm."

"Seeking your own happiness, you should pull out your own arrow: your own lamentation, and sorrow."

"What we are today comes from our thoughts of yesterday, and our present thoughts build our life of tomorrow. Our life is a creation of our mind."

"The non-doing of any evil, the performance of what's skillful, the cleansing of one's own mind: this is the teaching of the Awakened."

"Whatever an enemy might do to an enemy, or a foe to a foe, the ill-directed mind can do to you even worse. Whatever a mother, father or other kinsman might do for you, the well-directed mind can do for you even better."

"One by one, little by little, moment by moment, a wise man should remove his own impurities, as a smith removes his dross from silver."

"With arrow pulled out, independent, attaining peace of awareness, all grief transcended, griefless you are unbound."

"Focus, not on the rudenesses of others, not on what they've done or left undone, but on what you have and haven't done yourself."

"Irrigators guide the water. Fletchers shape the arrow shaft. Carpenters shape the wood. The wise control themselves. "

"First he'd settle himself in what is correct, only then teach others. He wouldn't stain his name: he is wise."

"Sole dominion over the earth, going to heaven, lordship over all worlds: the fruit of stream-entry excels them."

"Greater in battle than the man who would conquer a thousand-thousand men, is he who would conquer just one -- himself. Better to conquer yourself than others."

"Evil is done by oneself by oneself is one defiled. Evil is left undone by oneself by oneself is one cleansed. Purity & impurity are one's own doing. No one purifies another. No other purifies one."

"Regard him as one who points out treasure, the wise one who seeing your faults rebukes you. Stay with this sort of sage. For the one who stays with a sage of this sort, things get better, not worse. Let him admonish, instruct, deflect you away from poor manners. To the good, he's endearing; to the bad, he's not."

"Who once was heedless, but later is not, brightens the world like the moon set free from a cloud. His evil-done deed is replaced with skillfulness: he brightens the world like the moon set free from a cloud."

"Your own self is your own mainstay, for who else could your mainstay be? With you yourself well-trained you obtain the mainstay hard to obtain."

"Not even if it rained gold coins would we have our fill of sensual pleasures. 'Stressful, they give little enjoyment' -- knowing this, the wise one finds no delight even in heavenly sensual pleasures. He is one who delights in the ending of craving, a disciple of the Rightly Self-Awakened One."

"?He insulted me, hit me, beat me, robbed me' -- for those who brood on this, hostility isn't stilled. 'He insulted me, hit me, beat me, robbed me' -- for those who don't brood on this, hostility is stilled. Hostilities aren't stilled through hostility, regardless. Hostilities are stilled through non-hostility: this, an unending truth. Unlike those who don't realize that we're here on the verge of perishing, those who do: their quarrels are stilled."

"All too soon, this body will lie on the ground cast off, bereft of consciousness, like a useless scrap of wood."

"As rain seeps into an ill-thatched hut, so passion, the undeveloped mind. As rain doesn't seep into a well-thatched hut, so passion does not, the well-developed mind."

"A fool with a sense of his foolishness is -- at least to that extent -- wise. But a fool who thinks himself wise really deserves to be called a fool."

"Don't give way to heedlessness or to intimacy with sensual delight -- for a heedful person, absorbed in jhana, attains an abundance of ease."

"Having gone on his almsround, the sage should then go to the forest, standing or taking a seat at the foot of a tree. The enlightened one, intent on jhana, should find delight in the forest, should practice jhana at the foot of a tree, attaining his own satisfaction."

"Heedfulness: the path to the Deathless. Heedlessness: the path to death. The heedful do not die. The heedless are as if already dead."

"Even though a disciple of the noble ones has clearly seen as it has come to be with right discernment that sensuality is of much stress, much despair, and greater drawbacks, still -- if he has not attained a rapture and pleasure apart from sensuality, apart from unskillful mental qualities, or something more peaceful than that -- he can be tempted by sensuality. But when he has clearly seen as it has come to be with right discernment that sensuality is of much stress, much despair, and greater drawbacks, and he has attained a rapture and pleasure apart from sensuality, apart from unskillful qualities, or something more peaceful than that, he cannot be tempted by sensuality."

"Phenomena are preceded by the heart, ruled by the heart, made of the heart. If you speak or act with a corrupted heart, then suffering follows you -- as the wheel of the cart, the track of the ox that pulls it. Phenomena are preceded by the heart, ruled by the heart, made of the heart. If you speak or act with a calm, bright heart, then happiness follows you, like a shadow that never leaves"

"Through initiative, heedfulness, restraint, andself-control, the wise would make an island no flood can submerge."

"They're addicted to heedlessness -- dullards, fools -- while one who is wise cherishes heedfulness as his highest wealth."