Hong Zicheng Quote

When people are tethered to fame and fortune, they speak of the world as dust and the sea as bitter. They do not know of white clouds and clear wind, flowing rivers and majestic rocks, beckoning flowers and chirping birds, and the songs of woodcutters echoing in the valley. The world does not have to be one of dust and the sea one of bitterness,- it is you who mire yourself in the mud and belabor your mind.

Vegetable Roots Discourse: Wisdom from Ming China on Life and Living - Caicentan by Hong Zicheng (Shoemaker & Hoard, 2006), Translated by Robert Aitken with Daniel W. Y. Kwok, p. 155