He will not, like so many Western poets, turn philosopher and say that he is “one with” the flowers, the fence, the hills, and the birds. This, too, … - Alan Watts

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He will not, like so many Western poets, turn philosopher and say that he is “one with” the flowers, the fence, the hills, and the birds. This, too, is gilding the lily, or, in his own Oriental idiom, “putting legs on a snake.” For when you really understand that you are what you see and know, you do not run around the countryside thinking, “I am all this.” There is simply “all this.