Residing here at Mt. Minobu is truly like living in the everlasting land of the gods where blessings come down from heaven. Even uncultured men and women would be attracted to this place. In the forlorn autumn twilight, the dew is deep around my grass hut and in the eaves it is strung like pearls on spider webs. The leaves deepen into scarlet and are reflected in the intermittent flow in the bamboo water pipes, and seeing them one would not doubt that it is like the view on the upper Tatsutakawa River.

Also, behind my home the rugged mountains rise up out of the depths, and the fruits of the treetops would fill the One Vehicle. Below the branches the cicadas sing raucously. In front of my hut, the rushing waters flow by. The moon of the thus-so nature that is the true aspect of all things floats overhead in a sky cleared of the darkness of deep ignorance because there are no clouds in the sky of Dharma-nature. In this tranquil setting, inside my hut we spend all day discussing the Dharma of the Wonderful Sūtra of the One Vehicle, and all through the night there is the sound of our recitation of the crucial writings. It is as though Mt. Sacred Eagle where I heard the World Honored One Śākyamuni lived had been brought right here. In the rising fog and severe storms, I go into the mountains to cut firewood. Through the dewy grass I go down into the deep valleys to collect water parsley. In the rapids of the swift mountain streams I rinse vegetables, and as I impatiently wait for my dampened sleeves to dry I think of the old poet Hitomaro who recited, “At Waka-no-ura, the fishermen think of the passing of their lives as they wait for the seaweed to dry.”

Minobu-san Gosho, Mt. Minobu Letter, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Volume 5, Page 125-126