Buddhist point of view in the research process

I'm looking for some texts where the Buddha explains the nature of mind in relation with the process of learning/researching. I was reading a quote by a famous mathematician known to be very interested in Buddhism and I thought his point of view was related to some teachings of the Buddha. I would like to read more Buddhist literature to see if this connection is real. The quote: > The unknown thing to be known appeared to me as some stretch of earth or hard marl, resisting penetration… the sea advances insensibly in silence, nothing seems to happen, nothing moves, the water is so far off you hardly hear it.. yet it finally surrounds the resistant substance. (Alexander Grothendieck) I believe the idea of the "Rising Sea" can be understood in Buddhist terms. From my experience Buddhism has a lot of metaphors showing the mind/consciousness as an entity similar to the sea. I would like to see some texts where I can draw an analogy between the awakening process and the process of discovering something new.