| "To illustrate the extreme rarity of encountering this sutra, the Buddha likened it to the difficulty of a one-eyed turtle encountering a floating sandalwood log with a hollow in it. To give the essence of this analogy: Eighty thousand yojana down on the bottom of the ocean there lives a turtle. He has neither limbs nor flippers. His belly is as hot as heated iron while the shell on his back is as cold as the Snow Mountains. What this turtle yearns for day and night, morning and evening--the desire he utters at each moment--is to cool his belly and warm the shell on his back." |  |
