Those who wish to crush the many sorrows of existence,
Who wish to quell the pain of living beings,
Who wish to have experience of a myriad joys
Should never turn away from bodhichitta.

Should bodhichitta come to birth
In those who suffer, chained in prisons of samsara,
In that instant they are called the children of the Blissful One,
Revered by all the world, by gods and humankind.

For like the supreme substance of the alchemists,
It takes our impure flesh and makes of it
The body of a Buddha, jewel beyond all price.
Such is bodhicitta. Let us grasp it firmly!

Shantideva

from the book The Way of the Bodhisattva

translated by Padmakara Translation Group


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Further quotes from the book The Way of the Bodhisattva:

• Precious human life
• Training
• Not be seen again
• Should I serve my defiled emotions
• But in Their Ignorance
• Seen no more