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Lane-Fox G. - The Four Noble Truths of Buddhism (view source)
Revision as of 05:14, 1 November 2026
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(Proofread Lucifer volume I against original scans; correct text, footnotes, quotations, verse, contents and authorship) |
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| author = Lane-Fox, George | | author = Lane-Fox, George | ||
| title = The Four Noble Truths of Buddhism | | title = The Four Noble Truths of Buddhism | ||
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| original language = English | | original language = English | ||
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| origin = English: St. George Lane-Fox, ''The Four Noble Truths of Buddhism'' | | origin = English: St. George Lane-Fox, ''The Four Noble Truths of Buddhism'' | ||
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{{Page aside|49 | {{Page aside in Lucifer|v=1|n=1|p=49}} | ||
<span style="font-variant:small-caps">When</span> a man immersed in the darkness of modern civilization awakens, however slightly, to the hollowness of his every-day life, he becomes sensible of a feeling of despair, for he is mentally brought face to face with what appears to him to be a meaningless yet cruel destiny. Now to any one so circumstanced, no truer source of consolation and encouragement can be offered than that which is to be found in a proper consideration of the “Four Noble Truths” of Buddhism. But to give this proper consideration to the Truths, or indeed to promote even a preliminary enquiry into their nature is by no means an easy task, because the fundamental ideas which they embody have scarcely any vitality in the present generation; nay more, they involve for the most part a complete inversion of maxims commonly accepted as axiomatic in current thought. | <span style="font-variant:small-caps">When</span> a man immersed in the darkness of modern civilization awakens, however slightly, to the hollowness of his every-day life, he becomes sensible of a feeling of despair, for he is mentally brought face to face with what appears to him to be a meaningless yet cruel destiny. Now to any one so circumstanced, no truer source of consolation and encouragement can be offered than that which is to be found in a proper consideration of the “Four Noble Truths” of Buddhism. But to give this proper consideration to the Truths, or indeed to promote even a preliminary enquiry into their nature is by no means an easy task, because the fundamental ideas which they embody have scarcely any vitality in the present generation; nay more, they involve for the most part a complete inversion of maxims commonly accepted as axiomatic in current thought. | ||
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The first Truth may also be thus expressed: individual existence necessitates and involves change of state, whether manifested as birth growth, decay or death, and all changes of state are accompanied by pain in one form or another on some plane of being; while those who seem in their own eyes to have escaped from pain, or those who imagine that others escape from it, are alike deluded, for all men are overtaken by it soon or late. | The first Truth may also be thus expressed: individual existence necessitates and involves change of state, whether manifested as birth growth, decay or death, and all changes of state are accompanied by pain in one form or another on some plane of being; while those who seem in their own eyes to have escaped from pain, or those who imagine that others escape from it, are alike deluded, for all men are overtaken by it soon or late. | ||
The second Noble Truth deals with the cause of pain, and partially explains its meaning. According to this Truth, it is the desire or thirst for the continuance of individual life, with its various sensations and experiences, that constitutes the true basis of all suffering, whatever the outward form it may assume, and to whatever plane of consciousness it may belong. This thirst for life, called in the Sanscrit language {{Page aside|50}}Tanha, gives rise in the mind of man to a delusive belief in the ''permanence'' and ''reality'' of that separate personality, which, according to Buddhism, is no more than an ephemeral mode of individual existence; it further leads him to suppose that the numerous mental states which in their aggregate make up the personality, are, in themselves ''real''; and hence grows that rooted belief in the absolute reality of the manifold objects of sense, and that longing for their possession, that insatiable longing for the enhancement and for the multiplication of the experiences associated with these objects. | The second Noble Truth deals with the cause of pain, and partially explains its meaning. According to this Truth, it is the desire or thirst for the continuance of individual life, with its various sensations and experiences, that constitutes the true basis of all suffering, whatever the outward form it may assume, and to whatever plane of consciousness it may belong. This thirst for life, called in the Sanscrit language {{Page aside in Lucifer|v=1|n=1|p=50}}Tanha, gives rise in the mind of man to a delusive belief in the ''permanence'' and ''reality'' of that separate personality, which, according to Buddhism, is no more than an ephemeral mode of individual existence; it further leads him to suppose that the numerous mental states which in their aggregate make up the personality, are, in themselves ''real''; and hence grows that rooted belief in the absolute reality of the manifold objects of sense, and that longing for their possession, that insatiable longing for the enhancement and for the multiplication of the experiences associated with these objects. | ||
The second Truth, like the first, presents an aspect of the universal law already referred to. | The second Truth, like the first, presents an aspect of the universal law already referred to. | ||
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The fourth Noble Truth assures us that there is a way by which all men may, if they only choose, rapidly accomplish this displacement of Tanha by true Love; this way is called the Noble Eight-fold Path leading to enlightenment. | The fourth Noble Truth assures us that there is a way by which all men may, if they only choose, rapidly accomplish this displacement of Tanha by true Love; this way is called the Noble Eight-fold Path leading to enlightenment. | ||
Thus: – 1. Right fundamental Belief, ''i.e.'', the right basis mentally and spiritually upon which to establish true knowledge. 2. Right Intention, ''i.e.'', goodwill towards all that lives, singleness of purpose, correctness and purity of motive. 3. Right Speech, ''i.e.'', the use of becoming language, kindly temperate, fair and profitable; patient yet vigorous; thoughtful, courageous, honest and discriminating. 4. Right Behaviour ''i.e.'', active philanthropy. 5. Right means of Livelihood, ''i.e.'', honest and useful employment of one’s time, paying adequate attention to one’s own material needs and helping others to do the same, yet without care for the morrow. 6. Right Endeavour, ''i.e.'', putting one’s heart in one’s {{Page aside|51}}work. 7. Right Loneliness, ''i.e.'', self-contained and harmonious within. 8. Right Meditation. This is the Sanskrit ''Yoga'' and signifies union with the divine by practising the contemplation of the reality of being. It is the result of a sustained effort to concentrate the mind upon the universal, eternal and immutable law of life; the first stage of such concentration takes the form of an impartial review or survey of all one’s thoughts, actions, desires, sensations and experiences from a thoroughly impersonal standpoint. This Eightfold Path has four stages representing different degrees of advancement towards Buddhahood or the state of perfect enlightenment. The true Buddha or Tathâgata is one who has attained final emancipation from individual existence, whose purified spirit is freed from the last vestige of Tanha, one upon whom Karma has no more hold, for he has reached Para Nirvana, the ''Eternal'', the Absolute Being. | Thus: – 1. Right fundamental Belief, ''i.e.'', the right basis mentally and spiritually upon which to establish true knowledge. 2. Right Intention, ''i.e.'', goodwill towards all that lives, singleness of purpose, correctness and purity of motive. 3. Right Speech, ''i.e.'', the use of becoming language, kindly temperate, fair and profitable; patient yet vigorous; thoughtful, courageous, honest and discriminating. 4. Right Behaviour ''i.e.'', active philanthropy. 5. Right means of Livelihood, ''i.e.'', honest and useful employment of one’s time, paying adequate attention to one’s own material needs and helping others to do the same, yet without care for the morrow. 6. Right Endeavour, ''i.e.'', putting one’s heart in one’s {{Page aside in Lucifer|v=1|n=1|p=51}}work. 7. Right Loneliness, ''i.e.'', self-contained and harmonious within. 8. Right Meditation. This is the Sanskrit ''Yoga'' and signifies union with the divine by practising the contemplation of the reality of being. It is the result of a sustained effort to concentrate the mind upon the universal, eternal and immutable law of life; the first stage of such concentration takes the form of an impartial review or survey of all one’s thoughts, actions, desires, sensations and experiences from a thoroughly impersonal standpoint. This Eightfold Path has four stages representing different degrees of advancement towards Buddhahood or the state of perfect enlightenment. The true Buddha or Tathâgata is one who has attained final emancipation from individual existence, whose purified spirit is freed from the last vestige of Tanha, one upon whom Karma has no more hold, for he has reached Para Nirvana, the ''Eternal'', the Absolute Being. | ||
{{Style P-Signature in capitals|St. George Lane-Fox.}} | {{Style P-Signature in capitals|St. George Lane-Fox.}} | ||