“The original man is the constant concern of Zen. In your innermost being, no dust has gathered from outside, no thought is capable of reaching there. It is as pure and clean as ever. It never becomes old, it never becomes stale; its freshness is its nature.

“It is deep down, hidden in you. Many layers have been put upon it: layers of knowledge, layers of respectability, layers of morality; all kinds of honor, all kinds of belief systems. It has become a very thick wall, although it is only of words. A courageous and intelligent man can cut through the whole wall in the single blow of a sword. Otherwise it takes lives and lives taking away one layer then another layer. And while you are taking away layers, new layers are gathering. You have to clean your mirror every day; in twenty-four hours, new dust will have gathered.

“So enlightenment has to be in a single blow; otherwise it will take an infinity of time. You cannot go slow, you cannot postpone it. You have to take the leap this very moment because the next is never certain. Roads turn, and friends who are together become enemies. That which was possible this moment may not be possible the next moment.

“The whole world is a chaos and in a mess. It is not only now that it is in a chaos; it has always been in a chaos because so many millions of unconscious human beings are creating all kinds of dreams, projections, expectations, frustrations. The whole air is heavy with the clouds of unfulfilled hopes, incomplete desires. Even failures in success: knowing that you have achieved the goal that you had determined, you are still as ignorant and empty inside as you were before. They say in a proverb that nothing succeeds like success; it is only a half truth. I want to make it complete: nothing fails like success. And the second part is more important; otherwise kings would not renounce their kingdoms, Gautam Buddha would not have been born.”