Death carries off a man busy picking flowers with an besotted mind, like a great flood does a sleeping village.
Gautama BuddhaRead
If there is only empty space, with no suns nor planets in it, then space loses its substantiality.
Interpretation
Empty space loses its meaning without celestial bodies to define it.
This quote by Gautama Buddha emphasizes the idea that context gives substance to seemingly empty concepts. Just as empty space becomes meaningful through the presence of suns and planets, our understanding of life, existence, and purpose is shaped by the relationships and experiences we encounter in our surroundings.
In practice
In a lesson about perspective in art class, this quote can illustrate how the background enhances the subject.
Death carries off a man busy picking flowers with an besotted mind, like a great flood does a sleeping village.
A kind man who makes good use of wealth is rightly said to possess a great treasure; but the miser who hoards up his riches will have no profit.
There are having flowers in Spring, breezes in Summer, moon in Autumn, snows in Winter. If there is nothing worrying over you, it will be the best seasons at all times.
Make an island of yourself, make yourself your refuge; there is no other refuge. Make truth your island, make truth your refuge; there is no other refuge.
When a wise man is advised of his errors, he will reflect on and improve his conduct. When his misconduct is pointed out, a foolish man will not only disregard the advice but rather repeat the same error.
The tongue like a sharp knife ... Kills without drawing blood.
They can make no law which will not have its full operation on themselves and their friends, as well as on the great mass of the society.
The true Vedantic spirit does not start out with a system of preconceived ideas. It possesses absolute liberty and unrivalled courage among religions with regard to the facts to be observed and the diverse hypotheses it has laid down for their coordination. Never having been hampered by a priestly order, each man has been entirely free to search wherever he pleased for the spiritual explanation of the spectacle of the universe.
Murray said, ´I don´t trust anybody´s nostalgia but my own. Nostalgia is a product of dissatisfaction and rage. It´s a settling of grievances between the present and the past. The more powerful the nostalgia, the closer you come to violence. War is the form nostalgia takes when men are hard-pressed to say something good about their country.´
I'm no model lady. A model's just an imitation of the real thing.
We know only that we are living in these bodies and have a vague idea, because we have heard it, and because our faith tells us so, that we possess souls. As to what good qualities there may be in our souls, or who dwells within them, or how precious they are, those are things which seldom consider and so we trouble little about carefully preserving the soul's beauty.
The essence of religion consists in the feeling of an absolute dependence.
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