“Here is a piece of paper,” Yung Wun told the boy, “which I will place in the window. Now, you can only see through this little hole—which I have made with a pin. Look through this pinhole at the bull. Never stop looking at it until you can see the bull creeping in through the pinhole.”

The obedient boy did as he was told and, without taking his eyes off the bull, peered through the hole, day after day, for three years. Then, one day, he suddenly cried out: “Master, the bull is coming in through the hole!”

All of a sudden, the boy saw his previous life. All that he had forgotten when he was reborn flooded back to his memory as his mind became identified with his old soul. And he knew that his name was Myung Dong-ji.

He turned to his master Yung Wun: They both knew that the master was the pupil and the pupil was the master. Now, their knowledge was complete. They wept with joy and mutual gratitude.

The Youngest Schoolboy

In a certain boarding school there lived one hundred boys.  One night they all went to bed in the dormitory as usual. Soon they were all asleep as healthy boys ought to be; only the youngest stayed awake.

Shortly after midnight he heard someone coming in from outside. A female voice counted the shoes that were lined up at the door. “One hundred pairs,” said the voice. “So, there are one hundred human beings here. Just the number I need.”

When she came closer, the boy saw in the moonlight how white and beautiful she was. She proceeded to kiss the sleeping boys on their lips, one after another and as soon as a boy had been kissed, he died. Slowly she worked her way toward him because, being the youngest, his bed was at the far end of the hall. But before she came near him, the boy slipped out of bed, crept noiselessly under the beds, and joined the boys who were already dead.

When the white woman arrived at the last boy she counted “Ninety-nine.” She went back to the door and recounted the pairs of shoes. Muttering “One hundred,” she went back to the beds and started counting the ninety-nine dead boys, saying to herself: “If I kiss a hundred living human beings to death, I shall become an immortal in heaven.”