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ZEN BUDDHISM of the Japanese fencer, Dr. Suzuki says that it has affinities with Ignorance itself. The beginner in swordsmanship just parries the blow that is aimed at him. He does not think, and does not need to know. Nothing stops his flow of mind and its appropriate action. But as soon as he begins to know, he begins to think, and by the time he has thought what to do his opponent's sword has landed on his head, and neatly cut him in two. But when he knows all there is to know about the art of fencing, he will once more cease to think before acting, and be as "ignorant" as only the fool, the child and the truly spiritual man are satisfied to be. In terms of the mind, "the ignorant have not yet awakened their intelligence and therefore they retain their naïveté. The wise have gone to the end of their intelligence, and therefore they no more resort to it. The two are in a way good neighbours. Only those of 'half knowledge' have their heads filled with discriminations."'i
Is all about me but a projection from my thought upon the screen of circumstance, having no validity save in the mind which gave it birth? It is all very troubling, for, to use psychological terms, with the birth of the Self and the correspondingly diminished value of the self, a new sense of values appears, and the world is seen with new, though sorely troubled, eyes. All now is stress, though of a different order. A gulf is felt between the old life and the new, between one's former friends and interests and the new way of life which alone gives satisfaction to the ideal-laden mind. In time this inward turmoil leads to the "dark night of the soul" and a sense of loneliness, of severance from the human life about one,
1 Zen Buddhism and its Influence, pp. 77–78.
