知歸子曰。自漢以上。傳列女者。大都以婦順為先。至其後而卓絕瑰異之行乃閒出。推其志節。皎如冰霜。殆將乘罡風。御顥氣。而翱翔乎清都者耶。夫誠欲斷生死流。登涅槃岸。必當棲神寂泊之場。高蹈人天之表。是非夙植淨因。堅固誓願者。未有不退然自畫者也。予既集居士傳。已而為二女子授諸大乘經。因續采古今諸善女人得入法流者。凡百三十許人。合為傳。授二女子。俾傳而習之。
Zhigui Zi said: Before the Han dynasty, those who transmitted accounts of exemplary women mostly placed wifely compliance first. Only later did extraordinary and wondrous conduct occasionally emerge. Considering their resolve and integrity—bright as ice and frost—were they not those who would ride the fierce winds, harness the vast vapors, and soar in the pure capital of heaven? Truly, if one wishes to cut off the stream of birth and death and ascend to the shore of Nirvana, one must settle the spirit in the realm of stillness and quiet, and tread high above the worlds of gods and humans. Unless one has planted pure causes in former lives and made firm and steadfast Vows, none fails to retreat and draw back. Having already compiled the Biographies of Lay Buddhists, I thereafter bestowed various Mahayana sutras upon two women. I then continued to gather women of past and present who had entered the stream of the Dharma, in all about one hundred and thirty persons, and combined them into a collection of biographies. I bestowed it upon the two women, so that they might transmit and study it.