A Quote by Frederick Lenz

There is no letter of the law to follow in Zen. There is a lot of etiquette, but there are no rules.

Frederick Lenz

Quote Topics

Etiquette Follow Law Letter Lot No Rules Rules Zen

Quote Author

Frederick Lenz
American - Author
February 9, 1950 - April 12, 1998

Tantric Zen is the original Zen, Zen without rules, Zen without form. Zen can certainly take rules and form. So Tantric Zen might have some rules and form, but it would remain formless even though it had rules and form.

Frederick Lenz

A jurist can obey the letter of the law and violate its spirit, or it can follow the spirit of the law and violate the letter of the law. I want someone who can reconcile the letter and the spirit of the law without partisan leanings.

Ron Crumpton

Ballroom dancing: it's a wonderful thing at so many levels because you've got to follow the rules. They used to call those rules etiquette once upon a time, but you don't really have that any more.

Anton du Beke

Adorn thyself with simplicity and with indifference towards the things which lie between virtue and vice. Love mankind. Follow God. The poet says that Law rules all. And it is enough to remember that law rules all.

Marcus Aurelius

You can deny all you want that there is etiquette, and a lot of people do in everyday life. But if you behave in a way that offends the people you're trying to deal with, they will stop dealing with you...There are plenty of people who say, 'We don't care about etiquette, but we can't stand the way so-and-so behaves, and we don't want him around!' Etiquette doesn't have the great sanctions that the law has. But the main sanction we do have is in not dealing with these people and isolating them because their behavior is unbearable.

Judith Martin

I have had to make a decision I may not agree with, but I am required to follow the letter of the law. It is not my job to think what is best... My responsibility is to decide what the law says and to decide to the law.

Charles T. Canady

To sacrifice the principles of manners, which require compassion and respect, and bat people over the head with their ignorance of etiquette rules they cannot be expected to know is both bad manners and poor etiquette. That social climbers and twits have misused etiquette throughout history should not be used as an argument for doing away with it.

Judith Martin

People think, mistakenly, that etiquette means you have to suppress your differences. On the contray, etiquette is what enables you to deal with them; it gives you a set of rules.

Judith Martin

The purpose of etiquette is to provide an easy set of rules which we can follow when we are in a hurry and want to make sure that we do not give offense to anybody.

Angela Lansbury

What I term Zen, old Zen, the original face of Zen, new Zen, pure Zen, or Tantric Zen is - Zen in its essence.

Frederick Lenz

There are monasteries in Japan where they teach Zen with rules, more rules than you can imagine, and you might feel comfortable with that. I don't teach that type of Zen.

Frederick Lenz

It is only in the last 800 years that the rules have come into being and conservative Zen has surfaced. It is not particularly popular in Japan at all. Hardly anybody practices Zen any more because it's just too strict; there are too many rules.

Frederick Lenz

I'm completely the opposite of an etiquette icon. I'm brash, and I don't follow any social rules, really. I'm nice, but really, I'm the least-put-together lady in the world.

Barbie Ferreira

Etiquette is about all of human social behavior. Behavior is regulated by law when etiquette breaks down or when the stakes are high - violations of life, limb, property and so on. Barring that, etiquette is a little social contract we make that we will restrain some of our more provocative impulses in return for living more or less harmoniously in a community.

Judith Martin

Obviously you follow the law of the land, there are many laws I disagree with, but you follow the law. You fight to change the law, you don't break the law. I believe that's the American way.