Believe nothing, O monks, just because you have been told it, or it is commonly believed, or because it is traditional or because you yourselves have imagined it. Do not believe what your teacher tells you merely out of respect for the teacher. But whatsoever, after due examination and analysis, you find to be conducive to the good, the benefit, the welfare of all beings - that doctrine believe and cling to and take as your guide.
'I've got children', 'I've got wealth.' This is the way a fool brings suffering on himself. He does not even own himself, so how can he have children or wealth?
Regard this fleeting world like this:
Like stars fading and vanishing at dawn,
like bubbles on a fast-moving stream,
like morning dewdrops evaporating on blades of grass,
like a candle flickering in a strong wind...
echoes, mirages, and phantoms, hallucinations,
and like a dream.
I will purify my bodily actions through repeated reflection. I will purify my verbal actions through repeated reflection. I will purify my mental actions through repeated reflection. That's how you should train yourself.
There is, monks, an unborn, unbecome, unmade, unconditioned. If, monks, there were no unborn... no escape would be discerned from what is born, become, made, conditioned. But because there is an unborn..., therefore an escape is discerned from what is born, become, made, conditioned.
A person writing at night may put out the lamp, but the words he has written will remain. It is the same with the destiny we create for ourselves in this world.