nirvanas

Updated: May 16, 2025

Idlers, workers, unhappy ones they come to forget, to let the agate eye of the lake stare them into a few hours of oblivion. But there is something else. Long ago men hunted and fished to keep alive. They fought with animals and sat with empty stomachs staring at the water, not in quest of Nirvanas but of fish.

Ben Hecht - A Thousand and One Afternoons in Chicago

But there are two Nirvanas; that of entire passionlessness attained in this life, and the consummate Nirvana entered at death. The saint does not need to wait for death for his redemption, nor must he hasten his death in order to enjoy it fully; Buddha, by example and by precept, forbids any such anticipation.

Allan Menzies - History of Religion: A Sketch of Primitive Religious Beliefs and Practices, and of the Origin and Character of the Great Systems