Speaking paradoxically, one might say: If
there were no Buddhism, it would have to be invented...
In the ultimate analysis there are only two things: the world, actuality, life,
or whatever else one chooses to call it; and the knowledge of all this,
consciousness. More there is not; and yet this is not enough. The fact that
mental life is present proves that; for mental life, whether it present itself
as religion, as science, as philosophy, or however else, is nothing but the
unresting search for a mental life...
Buddhism is no act of faith, and it is no scientific procedure of proof. It is
drama, the unique, single, actual, moving drama of the struggle of truth with
life, of life with truth. And that here it is question of a purely mental combat
is proved through itself, inasmuch as the single prize of victory which remains
in the hands of the victor in this fight is the No-more-ignorance-the sole palm
of victory which actuality has to bestow upon the thinker and seeker.
