Why Can't One Escape the Body of an Ant?

The world is vast, the buddha-lands are vast, the universe is vast—beyond what the conscious mind can imagine. At best, we are like ants. What is there in the world of ants? What is there in an ant's life worth pursuing, worth fussing over, worth taking pride in? Is there anything in the ant kingdom worth fighting over? What is there in each ant's five-aggregate body worth clinging to and craving?

Yet when the Buddha observed the ant colonies, He saw that they were truly far too attached to their own five-aggregate bodies. Seven buddhas have appeared in the world, and the ants are still ants. This is precisely a manifestation of the ants' foolish nature, a manifestation of their attachment. What difference is there between us and the ants? Countless buddhas have appeared in the world, and we are still beings of the six realms, still just as foolish and attached, still burdened with such deep and heavy ignorance. Are we not ashamed? Do we not reproach ourselves? Do we not even possess the two wholesome mental factors of shame and remorse (hri-apatrāpya)?

Wisdom is above all else; liberation is more important than anything. No matter how much hardship one must endure to attain it, it is all worthwhile. Otherwise, one will remain foolish and pitiable forever, just like the ants—while still imagining oneself to be so great!

Many people have been studying Buddhism for so long, yet they are still interested in mountains and rivers, traveling everywhere to play, craving and loving the scenery before their eyes, not knowing to cherish their precious time for cultivation. They do not realize how far an ant-like self can travel. However capable a colony of ants may be at walking, day and night without rest, they can hardly make it across a patch of desert, let alone out of a whole country. Even if we take an airplane, we can hardly leave the airspace above the earth. It would be better to open our own minds, broaden our horizons, embrace the entire great thousand worlds, and explore the infinite mysteries of the universe, so that we may come to know all things and be capable of all things, becoming a true person of wisdom and a capable one like the Buddha, possessing boundless breadth of mind and boundless wisdom, virtue, and ability.