The importance and unimportance of the self cannot be exaggerated.

What is Zen? Zen is looking at things with the eye of God, that is, becoming the thing's eyes so that it looks at itself with our eyes.

There is no greater difference between men than between grateful and ungrateful people.

Regarding R. H. Blyth: Blyth's four volume Haiku became especially popular at this time [1950's] because his translations were based on the assumption that the haiku was the poetic expression of Zen. Not surprisingly, his books attracted the attention of the Beat school, most notably writers such as Allen Ginsberg, Gary Snyder and Jack Kerouac, all of whom had a prior interest in Zen.

The love of nature is religion, and that religion is poetry; these three things are one thing. This is the unspoken creed of haiku poets.

There is nothing intrinsically more beautiful or poetical about the moon than about a dunghill; if anything, the contrary, for the latter is full of life and warmth and energy.

There is a Hindu myth about the Self or God of the universe who sees life as a form of play. But since the Self is what there is and all that there is and thus has no one separate to play with, he plays the cosmic game of hide-and-seek with himself. He takes on the roles and masks of individual people such as you and I and thus becomes involved in exciting and terrifying adventures, all the time forgetting who he really is.