It’s as if someone were to say: ‘I’ll make a basket out of lotus leaves or flame-of-the-forest leaves or camel’s foot creeper leaves, and use it to carry water or ripe palmyra fruit.’ That is possible. In the same way, suppose someone were to say: ‘After truly comprehending the noble truths of suffering, its origin, its cessation, and the path, I will completely make an end of suffering.’ That is possible.

That’s why you should practice meditation …”

Linked Discourses 56.33 4. In a Rosewood Forest A Stick

“Mendicants, suppose a stick was tossed up in the air. Sometimes it’d fall on its bottom and sometimes the top. It’s the same for sentient beings roaming and transmigrating, shrouded by ignorance and fettered by craving. Sometimes they go from this world to the other world, and sometimes they come from the other world to this world. Why is that? It’s because they haven’t seen the four noble truths. What four? The noble truths of suffering, its origin, its cessation, and the path.

That’s why you should practice meditation …”

Linked Discourses 56.34 4. In a Rosewood Forest Clothes

“Mendicants, if your clothes or head were on fire, what would you do about it?” “Sir, if our clothes or head were on fire, we’d apply extraordinary enthusiasm, effort, zeal, vigor, perseverance, mindfulness, and situational awareness in order to extinguish it.”