I
My friend opened a thin yellow volume of that marvellous text which
proclaims at sight the patience of the Buddhist engraver. Movable
Chinese types may be very useful; but the best of which they are
capable is ugliness itself when compared with the beauty of the old
block-printing.
“I have a queer story for you,” he said.
“A Japanese story?”
“No,--Chinese.”
“What is the book?”
“According to Japanese pronunciation of the Chinese characters of the
title, we call it _Mu-Mon-Kwan_, which means ‘The Gateless Barrier.’
It is one of the books especially studied by the Zen sect, or sect
of Dhyâna. A peculiarity of some of the Dhyâna texts,--this being a
good example,--is that they are not explanatory. They only suggest.
Questions are put; but the student must think out the answers for
himself. He must _think_ them out, but not write them. You know that
Dhyâna represents human effort to reach, through meditation, zones of
thought beyond the range of verbal expression; and any thought once
narrowed into utterance loses all Dhyâna quality.... Well, this story is
supposed to be true; but it is used only for a Dhyâna question. There
are three different Chinese versions of it; and I can give you the
substance of the three.”