Siddhartha (Wisehouse Classics Edition)

by Hermann Hesse

"Listen, my friend, listen well. The sinner, such as me, such as you, is a sinner, but he will one day become once more Brahma, he will one day achieve nirvana, will become a buddha—but now think of this: this 'one day' is delusion, it is only a comparison! The sinner is not on his way to becoming a buddha, he is not engrossed in any kind of development, even though it is not possible for our thought to imagine these things in any other way. No, the prospective buddha is already within the sinner, now and today, his future is all already there, within him, within you, within everyone is that which will be, that which is possible, that which is the hidden buddha to be honoured. The world, Govinda my friend, is not imperfect, nor is it trapped on a weary road to perfection: no, it has perfection in every glance of the eye, every sin contains mercy within it, every little child has the old man within it, every suckling has death within it, every dying man has eternal life within him. No man is able to see how far he has progressed along his path by looking at others, within the thief and within the gambler the buddha is waiting, within the brahmin the thief is waiting. In deep meditation, it is possible to remove time and to see all that has been, all that is and all that will be in one moment, and in that moment all is good, all is perfect, all is Brahman. That is why it appears to me that all that is is good, death appears to me as the same as life, sin appears to me the sa...