D.T. Suzuki

Zen has no business with ideas.

Who would then deny that when I am sipping tea in my tearoom I am swallowing the whole universe with it and that this very moment of my lifting the bowl to my lips is eternity itself transcending time and space?

The truth of Zen, just a little bit of it, is what turns one’s humdrum life into one of art.

I like to be beholden to the great metropolitan English speech, the sea which receives tributaries from every region under heaven.

If in doubt, don’t. If still in doubt, do what’s right.

Justice is my being allowed to do whatever I like. Injustice is whatever prevents my doing so.

An empire is an immense egotism.

In the word of no master am I bound to believe.

Slanderers do not hurt me because they do not hit me.

The quieter you become, you more you are able to hear.

Shame arises from the fear of men, conscience from the fear of God.

Count on it, if a person talks of their misfortune, there is something in it that is not disagreeable to them.

At fifteen life had taught me undeniably that surrender, in its place, was as honorable as resistance, especially if one had no choice.

A good and faithful judge ever prefers the honorable to the expedient.

I would rather be attacked than unnoticed. For the worst thing you can do to an author is to be silent as to his works. An assault upon a town is a bad thing; but starving it is still worse.

Out of the unconscious lips of babes and sucklings are we satirized.

Our humanity is a poor thing, except for the divinity that stirs within us.

Truth is beautiful, without doubt; but so are lies.