Zen in its essence is the art of seeing into the nature of one’s own being, and it points the way from bondage to freedom. By making us drink right from the fountain of life, it liberates us from all the yokes under which we finite beings are usually suffering in this world. We can say that Zen liberates all the energies properly and naturally stored in each of us, which are in ordinary circumstances cramped and distorted so that they find no adequate channel for activity. This volume being first in the series, is a collection of the essays originally published in The Eastern Buddhism, except one on the ‘History of Zen Buddhism’ which was written specially for the volume; but all of them have been thoroughly revised and in some parts entirely rewritten and new chapters added.