"It is a command from your Highness' late father," said the ministers, "and may not be disobeyed. What need for divination?"
So the old man of Tsang was received and entrusted with the administration. He altered none of the existing statutes. He issued no unjust regulations. And when, after three years, Wên Wang made another inspection, he found all dangerous organisations broken up, the officials doing their duty as a matter of course, while the use of measures of grain was unknown within the four boundaries of the State.
There was thus unanimity in the public voice, singleness of official purpose, and identity of interests to all.
So Wên Wang appointed the old man Grand Tutor; and then, standing with his face to the north, An attitude of respect. Facing the south was the conventional position of a ruler.
asked him, saying, "Can such government be extended over the empire?"
The old man of Tsang was silent and made no reply. He then abruptly took leave, and by the evening of that same day had disappeared, never to be heard of again.
Yen Yüan said to Confucius, "If Wên Wang was unable to do this of himself, how was he able to do it by a dream?"
"Silence!" cried Confucius: "It is not for you to criticise Wên Wang who succeeded in fulfilling his mission. The dream was merely to satisfy the vulgar mind."
The whole episode is of course spurious.
instructed Po Hun Wu Jên See ch. v.
in archery. Drawing the bow to its full, he placed a cup of water on his elbow and began to let fly. Hardly was one arrow out of sight ere another was on the string, the archer standing all the time like a statue.
"But this is shooting under ordinary conditions," cried Po Hun Wu Jên; "it is not shooting under extraordinary conditions. Now I will ascend a high mountain with you, and stand on the edge of a precipice a thousand feet in height, and see how you can shoot then."
Thereupon Wu Jên went with Lieh Tzŭ up a high mountain, and stood on the edge of a precipice a thousand feet in height, approaching it backwards until one-fifth of his feet overhung the chasm, when he beckoned to Lieh Tzŭ to come on. But the latter had fallen prostrate on the ground, with the sweat pouring down to his heels.
"The perfect man," said Wu Jên, "soars up to the blue sky, or dives down to the yellow springs, The infernal regions.
or flies to some extreme point of the compass, without change of countenance. But you are terrified, and your eyes are dazed. Your internal economy is defective."
You have not TAO.
said to Sun Shu Ao, A famous minister of the Ch'u State.
"Sir, you have been three times called to office without showing any elation, and you have been three times dismissed without displaying any chagrin. At first, I doubted you; but now I notice that your breathing is perfectly regular. How do you manage thus to control your emotions?"
"I am no better than other people," replied Sun Shu Ao. "I regard office when it comes as something which may not be declined; when it goes, as something which cannot be kept. To me both the getting and losing are outside my own self; and therefore I feel no chagrin. How am I better than other people?
"Besides, I am not conscious of office being either in the hands of others or in my own. If it is in the hands of others, my own personality disappears; if in mine, theirs. And amidst the cares of deliberation and investigation, what leisure has one for troubling about rank?"
When Confucius heard this, he said, "The perfect Sages of old!--cunning men could not defeat them; beautiful women could not seduce them; robbers could not steal from them; They were unmoved in the face of danger.
Fu Hsi and the Yellow Emperor could not make friends of them. Life and death are great; yet these gave them no pang.
That would cause them to sacrifice truth.
How much less then rank and power!
"The souls of such men pierced through huge mountains as though they had been nothing; descended into the abyss without getting wet; occupied lowly stations without chagrin. They filled the whole universe; and the more they gave to others, the more they had themselves."
These last words occur in chapter lxxxi. of the _Tao-Tê-Ching_. It is, to say the least, strange to find them here in the mouth of Confucius without a hint as to their alleged Taoistic source.
The explanation is that when this episode was penned, that patchwork treatise which passes under the name of the _Tao-Tê-Ching_ had not been pieced together.
* * * * * The Prince of Ch'u was sitting with the Prince of Fan. By and by, one of the officials of Ch'u said, "There were three indications of the destruction of the Fan State."
"The destruction of the Fan State," cried the Prince of Fan, "did not suffice to injure my existence.
Which was already, by virtue of TAO, beyond the reach of mundane influences.
And while the destruction of the Fan State did not suffice to injure my existence, the preservation of the Ch'u State will not be enough to preserve yours.
You being without TAO.
From this point of view it will be seen that while we Fans have not begun to be destroyed, you Ch'us have not begun to exist."
A good specimen of the _Fallacia Amphiboliæ_.
CHAPTER XXII.
KNOWLEDGE TRAVELS NORTH.
_Argument_:--Inaction and TAO--The universe our model--Spontaneity our watchword--Omnipresence and indivisibility of TAO--External activity, internal passivity--Man's knowledge finite--Illustrations.
[This chapter is supplementary to chapter vi.]
When Knowledge travelled north, across the Black Water, and over the Dark-Steep Mountain, he met Do-nothing Say-nothing and asked of him as follows:-- "Kindly tell me by what thoughts, by what cogitations, may TAO be known? By resting in what, by according in what, may TAO be approached?
By following what, by pursuing what, may TAO be attained?"
To these three questions, Do-nothing Say-nothing returned no answer.
Not that he would not answer, but that he could not. So when Knowledge got no reply, he turned round and went off to the south of the White Water and up the Ku-chüeh Mountain, where he saw All-in-extremes, and to him he put the same questions.
"Ha!" cried All-in-extremes, "I know. I will tell you..."
But just as he was about to speak he forgot what he wanted to say. So when Knowledge got no reply, he went back to the palace and asked the Yellow Emperor. The latter said, "By no thoughts, by no cogitations, TAO may be known. By resting in nothing, by according in nothing, TAO may be approached. By following nothing, by pursuing nothing, TAO may be attained."
Then Knowledge said to the Yellow Emperor, "Now you and I know this, but those two know it not. Who is right?"
"Of those two," replied the Yellow Emperor, "Do-nothing Say-nothing is genuinely right, and All-in-extremes is near. You and I are wholly wrong. Those who understand it do not speak about it, those who speak about it do not understand it.
These words occur in the _Tao-Tê-Ching_, ch. vi. See also _ante_, p.
170.
Therefore the Sage teaches a doctrine which does not find expression in words.
See _ante_, ch. v. Also _The Remains of Lao Tzŭ_, p. 7.
TAO cannot be made to come. Virtue cannot be reached.
Virtue (TÊ), here the exemplification of TAO.
Charity can be evoked. Duty to one's neighbour can be wrongly directed.
Ceremonies are mere shams.
"Therefore it has been said, 'If TAO perishes, then TÊ will perish. If TÊ perishes, then charity will perish. If charity perishes, then duty to one's neighbour will perish. If duty to one's neighbour perishes, then ceremonies will perish. Ceremonies are but a showy ornament of TAO, while oft-times the source of trouble.'
The above is from the _Tao-Tê-Ching_, ch. xxxviii. It is interesting to note how the Yellow Emperor annihilates time by quoting a work not written until many centuries after his date.
"Therefore it has been said, 'Those who practise TAO suffer daily loss.
If that loss proceeds until inaction ensues, then by that very inaction there is nothing which cannot be done.'
Also in the _Tao-Tê-Ching_, ch. xlviii.
"Now, we are already beings. And if we desire to revert to our original condition, how difficult that is! 'Tis a change to which only the greatest among us are equal.
"Life follows upon death. Death is the beginning of life. Who knows when the end is reached? The life of man results from convergence of the vital fluid. Its convergence is life; its dispersion, death. If then life and death are but consecutive states, what need have I to complain?
"Therefore all things are ONE. What we love is animation. What we hate is corruption. But corruption in its turn becomes animation, and animation once more becomes corruption.
"Therefore it has been said, The world is permeated by a single vital fluid, and Sages accordingly venerate ONE."
"Tota formatio procedens ex nomine uno." _Liber Jezirah_, p. Bi.
(Parisiis: G. Postello, 1552.)
Then Knowledge said to the Yellow Emperor, "I asked Do-nothing Say-nothing, but he did not answer me. Not that he, would not; he could not. So I asked All-in-extremes. He was just going to tell me, but he did not tell me. Not that he would not; but just as he was going to do so, he forgot what he wanted to say. Now I ask you, and you tell me.
How then are you wholly wrong?"
"Of those two," replied the Yellow Emperor, "the former was genuinely right, inasmuch as he did not _know_. The latter was near, inasmuch as he _forgot_. You and I are wholly wrong, inasmuch as we _know_."
TAO is attained, not by knowledge, but by absence of knowledge.
When All-in-extremes heard of this, he considered that the Yellow Emperor had spoken well.
"Spoken knowingly" gives the only chance of bringing out what is here a forced play upon words.
* * * * * The universe is very beautiful, yet it says nothing. The four seasons abide by a fixed law, yet they are not heard. All creation is based upon absolute principles, yet nothing speaks.
And the true Sage, taking his stand upon the beauty of the universe, pierces the principles of created things. Hence the saying that the perfect man does nothing, the true Sage performs nothing, beyond gazing at the universe.
In the hope of attaining, by contemplation, a like spontaneity.
For man's intellect, however keen, face to face with the countless evolutions of things, their death and birth, their squareness and roundness,--can never reach the root. There creation is, and there it has ever been.
But the secret of life is withheld.
The six cardinal points, reaching into infinity, are ever included in TAO. An autumn spikelet, in all its minuteness, must carry TAO within itself. There is nothing on earth which does not rise and fall, but it never perishes altogether.
Nihilo nil posse reverti.
The _Yin_ and the _Yang_, and the four seasons, keep to their proper order. Apparently destroyed, yet really existing; the material gone, the immaterial left;--such is the law of creation, which passeth all understanding. This is called the root, whence a glimpse may be obtained of God.
From this point, upon which the finger of man can never be laid, his mind may perhaps faintly discern the transcendent workings of that Power by which all creation is swayed;--"uncover those secret recesses where Nature is sitting at the fires in the depths of her laboratory."
_Swedenborg._ Yeh Ch'üeh enquired of P'i I about TAO.
For the former see ch. ii. Of the latter there is no record.
The latter said, "Keep your body under proper control, your gaze concentrated upon ONE,--and the peace of God will descend upon you.
Keep back your knowledge, and concentrate your thoughts upon ONE,--and the holy spirit shall abide within you. Virtue shall beautify you, TAO shall establish you, aimless as a new-born calf which recks not how it came into the world."
While P'i I was still speaking, Yeh Ch'üeh had gone off to sleep; at which the former rejoiced greatly, and departed singing, "Body like dry bone, Mind like dead ashes; This is true knowledge, Not to strive after knowing the whence.
In darkness, in obscurity, The mindless cannot plan;-- What manner of _man_ is that?"
His mortal trammels had fallen off by his absorption into TAO.
saying, "Can one get TAO so as to have it for one's own?"
"Your very body," replied Ch'êng, "is not your own. How should TAO be?"
"If my body," said Shun, "is not my own, pray whose is it?"
"It is the delegated image of God," replied Ch'êng. "Your life is not your own. It is the delegated harmony of God.
The affinity of the _Yin_ and _Yang_ causes them, when in due proportions, to combine and produce life.
Your individuality is not your own. It is the delegated adaptability of God.
Providing the endless variety of shapes with an endless variety of complexion.
Your posterity is not your own. It is the delegated exuviæ of God.
As God sends us into the world, so He wishes us to "increase and multiply."
You move, but know not how. You are at rest, but know not why. You taste, but know not the cause. These are the operation of God's laws.
How then should you get TAO so as to have it for your own?"
_Cf._ "Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost," etc. I. Corinthians vi. 19.
* * * * * Confucius said to Lao Tzŭ, "To-day you are at leisure. Pray tell me about perfect TAO."
"Purge your heart by fasting and discipline," answered Lao Tzŭ. "Wash your soul as white as snow. Discard your knowledge. TAO is abstruse and difficult of discussion. I will try, however, to speak to you of its outline.
"Light is born of darkness. Classification is born of formlessness. The soul is born of TAO. The body is born of the vital essence.
Existence springs from non-existence.
"Thus all things produce after their kind. Creatures with nine channels of communication are born from the womb. Creatures with eight are born from the egg.
Nature is always self-similar.
Of their coming there is no trace. In their departure there is no goal.
No entrance gate, no dwelling house, they pass this way and that, as though at the meeting of cross-roads.
"Those who enter herein become strong of limb, subtle of thought, and clear of sight and hearing. They suffer no mental fatigue, nor meet with physical resistance.
"Heaven cannot but be high. Earth cannot but be broad. The sun and moon cannot but revolve. All creation cannot but flourish. To do so is their TAO.
"But it is not from extensive study that this may be known, nor by dialectic skill that this may be made clear. The true Sage will have none of these. It is in addition without gain, in diminution without loss, that the true Sage finds salvation.
"Unfathomable as the sea, wondrously ending only to begin again, informing all creation without being exhausted, the TAO of the perfect man is spontaneous in its operation. That all creation can be informed by it without exhaustion, is its TAO.
The TAO of TAO.
"In the Middle Kingdom there are men who recognise neither positive nor negative. They abide between heaven and earth. They act their part as mortals, and then return to the Cause.
"From that standpoint, Of the Cause, _sc._ God, which is commensurate with infinity.
life is but a concentration of the vital fluid, whose longest and shortest terms of existence vary by an inappreciable space,---hardly enough for the classification of Yao and Chieh.
As good and bad. See ch. iv.
"Tree-fruits and plant-fruits exhibit order in their varieties; and the relationships of man, though more difficult to be dealt with, may still be reduced to order.
These have been classified as follows:-- 1. Sovereign and Subject.
2. Husband " Wife.
3. Father " Son.
4. Elder Brother " Younger Brother.
5. Friend " Friend.
The true Sage who meets with these, does not violate them. Neither does he continue to hold fast by them.
He adapts himself to the exigencies of his environment.
Adaptation by arrangement is TÊ. Spontaneous adaptation is TAO, by which sovereigns flourish and princes succeed.
"Man passes through this sublunary life as a white horse passes a crack. Here one moment, gone the next. Neither are there any not equally subject to the ingress and egress of mortality. One modification brings life; then another, and it is death. Living creatures cry out; human beings sorrow. The bow-sheath is slipped off; the clothes-bag is dropped; and in the confusion the soul wings its flight, and the body follows, on the great journey home!
"The reality of the formless, the unreality of that which has form,--this is known to all. Those who are on the road to attainment care not for these things, but the people at large discuss them.
Attainment implies non-discussion: discussion implies non-attainment.
Manifested, TAO has no objective value; hence silence is better than argument. It cannot be translated into speech; better then say nothing at all. This is called the great attainment."
* * * * * Tung Kuo Tzŭ asked Chuang Tzŭ, saying, "What you call TAO,--where is it?"
"There is nowhere," replied Chuang Tzŭ, "where it is not."
"Tell me one place at any rate where it is," said Tung Kuo Tzŭ.
"It is in the ant," replied Chuang Tzŭ.
"Why go so low down?" asked Tung Kuo Tzŭ.
"It is in a tare," said Chuang Tzŭ.
"Still lower," objected Tung Kuo Tzŭ.
"It is in a potsherd," said Chuang Tzŭ.
"Worse still!" cried Tung Kuo Tzŭ.
"It is in ordure," said Chuang Tzŭ. And Tung Kuo Tzŭ made no reply.
"Sir," continued Chuang Tzŭ, "your question does not touch the essential. When Huo, inspector of markets, asked the managing director about the fatness of pigs, the test was always made in parts least likely to be fat. Do not therefore insist in any particular direction; for there is nothing which escapes. Such is perfect TAO; and such also is ideal speech. _Whole_, _entire_, _all_, are three words which sound differently but mean the same. Their purport is ONE.
"Try to reach with me the palace of Nowhere, and there, amidst the identity of all things, carry your discussions into the infinite. Try to practise with me inaction, wherein you may rest motionless, without care, and be happy. For thus my mind becomes an abstraction. It wanders not, and yet is not conscious of being at rest. It goes and comes and is not conscious of stoppages. Backwards and forwards without being conscious of any goal. Up and down the realms of Infinity, wherein even the greatest intellect would fail to find an end.
"That which makes things the things they are, is not limited to such things. The limits of things are their own limits in so far as they are things. The limits of the limitless, the limitlessness of the limited,--these are called fulness and emptiness, renovation and decay.
TAO causes fulness and emptiness, but it is not either. It causes renovation and decay, but it is not either. It causes beginning and end, but it is not either. It causes accumulation and dispersion, but it is not either."
* * * * * O Ho Kan was studying with Shên Nung under Lao Lung Chi.
No record of the first and last. Shên Nung was a legendary emperor who invented agriculture. See p. 196.
Shên Nung used to remain shut up, with his head on the table, absorbed in day-dreams. On one occasion, O Ho Kan knocked at the door, and entering said, "Lao Lung is dead!"
Thereupon Shên Nung, leaning on his staff, arose; and flinging down his staff with a bang, smiled and said, "O my Master, thou knewest me to be worthless and self-sufficient, and thou didst leave me and die. Now I, having no scope for my vain talk, I too will die."
When Yen Kang Tiao "A man of TAO." _Comm._ heard this, he said, "Those who exemplify TAO are sought after by all the best men in the empire. Now if one who has not attained to more TAO than the ten-thousandth part of the tip of an autumn spikelet, is still wise enough to withhold vain talk and die,--how much more those who exemplify TAO? To the eye it is formless, and to the ear it is noiseless. Those who discuss it, speak of it as 'the obscure.' But the mere fact of discussing TAO makes it not TAO."
* * * * * At this the Empyrean asked Without-end, saying, "Do you know TAO?"
"I do not," replied Without-end; whereupon the Empyrean proceeded to ask Inaction.
"I do know TAO," said Inaction.
"Is there any method," asked the Empyrean, "by which you know TAO?"
"There is," replied Inaction.
"What is it?" asked the Empyrean.
"I know," answered Inaction, "that TAO may honour and dishonour, bind and loose. That is the method by which I know TAO."
The Empyrean repeated these words to No-beginning, and asked him which was right, the ignorance of Without-end or the knowledge of Inaction.
"Not to know," replied No-beginning, "is profound. To know is shallow.
Not to know is internal. To know is external."
Here the Empyrean broke in with a sigh, "Then ignorance is knowledge, and knowledge ignorance! But pray whose knowledge is the knowledge of not knowing?"
"TAO," said No-beginning, "cannot be heard. Heard, it is not TAO. It cannot be seen. Seen, it is not TAO. It cannot be spoken. Spoken, it is not TAO. That which imparts form to forms is itself formless; therefore TAO cannot have a name."
Form precedes name.
No-beginning continued, "He who replies to one asking about TAO, does not know TAO. Although one may hear about TAO, he does not really hear about TAO. There is no such thing as asking about TAO. There is no such thing as answering such questions. To ask a question which cannot be asked is vain. To answer a question which cannot be answered is unreal. And one who thus meets the vain with the unreal is one who has no physical perception of the universe, and no mental perception of the origin of existence,--unfit alike to roam over the K'un-lun peak or to soar into the Supreme Void."
* * * * * Light asked Nothing, saying, "Do you, Sir, exist, or do you not exist?"
But getting no answer to his question, Light set to work to watch for the appearance of Nothing.
Hidden, vacuous,--all day long he looked but could not see it, listened but could not hear it, grasped at but could not seize it.
See _The Remains of Lao Tzŭ_, p. 31.
"Bravo!" cried Light. "Who can equal this? I can get to be nothing, Darkness.
but I cannot get as far as the absence of nothing. Assuming that Nothing has an objective existence, how can it reach this next stage?"
* * * * * The man who forged swords for the Minister of War was eighty years of age. Yet he never made the slightest slip in his work.
The Minister of War said to him, "Is it your skill, Sir, or have you any method?"
Any TAO?--in its earlier sense of _way_ of doing things.
"It is concentration," replied the man. "When twenty years old, I took to forging swords. I cared for nothing else. If a thing was not a sword, I did not notice it. I availed myself of whatever energy I did not use in other directions in order to secure greater efficiency in the direction required. Still more of that which is never without use;-- TAO.
So that there was nothing which did not lend its aid.
* * * * * Jen Ch'iu asked Confucius, saying, "Can we know about the time before the universe existed?"
"We can," replied Confucius. "Time was of old precisely what it is now."
At this rebuff, Jen Ch'iu withdrew. Next day he again visited Confucius and said, "Yesterday when I asked you that question and you answered me, I was quite clear about it. To-day I am confused. How is this?"
"Your clearness of yesterday," answered Confucius, "was because my answer appealed direct to your natural intelligence. Your confusion of to-day results from the intrusion of something other than the natural intelligence.
You have passed from "simple apprehension" to "judgment."
There is no past, no present, no beginning, no end.
To-day will be the yesterday of to-morrow.
To have posterity before one has posterity,--is that possible?"
Jen Ch'iu made no answer, and Confucius continued, "That will do.
Do not reply. If life did not give birth to death, and if death did not put an end to life, surely life and death would be no longer correlates, but would each exist independently. What there was before the universe, was TAO. TAO makes things what they are, but is not itself a thing. Nothing can produce TAO; yet everything has TAO within it, and continues to produce it without end.
In its offspring.
And the endless love of the Sage for his fellow-man is based upon the same principle."
* * * * * Yen Yüan asked Confucius, saying, "Master, I have heard you declare that there may be no eagerness to conform, no effort to adapt. If so, pray how are we to get along?"
Reach that condition which is only attained by adaptation to environment.
"The men of old," replied Confucius, "practised physical, but not moral, modification.
They adapted themselves to the requirements of matter, while their hearts remained the same.
The men of to-day practise moral, not physical modification.
They allow their hearts to be influenced while resisting the exigencies of the external.
Let your modification extend to the external only. Internally, be constant without modification.
"How shall you modify, and how shall you not modify? How reconcile the divergence?--By not admitting division.
_I.e._ "by being constant without modification," says Lin Hsi Chung.
"There was the garden of Hsi Wei, the park of the Yellow Emperor, the palace of Shun, the halls of T'ang and Wu.
The allusion appears to be to schools of learning, like the Grove of Academus. See chs. vi, xii.
These were perfect men; but had they been taught by Confucianists and Mihists, they would have hammered one another to pieces over scholastic quibbles. How much more then the men of to-day?
"The perfect Sage, in his relations with the external world, injures nothing. Neither does anything injure him. And only he who is thus exempt can be trusted to conform and to adapt.
"Mountain forests and loamy fields swell my heart with joy. But ere the joy be passed, sorrow is upon me again.
Familiarity destroys the charm.
Joy and sorrow come and go, and over them I have no control.
"Alas! the life of man is but as a stoppage at an inn. He knows that which comes within the range of his experience. Otherwise, he knows not. He knows that he can do what he can do, and that he cannot do what he cannot do. But there is always that which he does not know and that which he cannot do; and to struggle that it shall not be so,--is not this a cause for grief?
"The best language is that which is not spoken, the best form of action is that which is without deeds.
Then conformity and adaptation are not required.
Spread out your knowledge and it will be found to be shallow."
It will by no means cover the area of the knowable. "Read this chapter," says one critic, "and the _Tripitaka_ and the _Mahâyâna_ will open out before you as beneath a sharp-edged blade."
CHAPTER XXIII.
KÊNG SANG CH'U.
_Argument_:--The operation of TAO is not seen--Spheres of action vary--TAO remains the same--Spontaneity essential--TAO can be divided but remains entire--It is infinite as Time and Space--It is unconditioned--The external and the internal--Illustrations.
Among the disciples of Lao Tzŭ was one named Kêng Sang Ch'u. He alone had attained to the TAO of his Master. He lived up north, on the Wei-lei Mountains. Of his attendants, he dismissed those who were systematically clever or conventionally charitable. The useless remained with him; the incompetent served him. And in three years the district of Wei-lei was greatly benefited.
One of the inhabitants said in conversation, "When Mr. Kêng Sang first came among us, we did not know what to make of him. Now, we could not say enough about him in a day, and even a year would leave something unsaid. Surely he must be a true Sage. Why not pray to him as to the spirits, and honour him as a tutelary god of the land?"
On hearing of this, Kêng Sang Ch'u turned his face to the south Towards the abode of Lao Tzŭ.
in shame, at which his disciples were astonished. But Kêng Sang said, "What cause have you for astonishment? The influence of spring quickens the life of plants, and autumn brings them to maturity. In the absence of any agent, how is this so? It is the operation of TAO.
"I have heard that the perfect man may be pent up like a corpse in a tomb, yet the people will become unartificial and without care.
So powerful will be his influence.
But now these poor people of Wei-lei wish to exalt me among their wise and good. Surely then I am but a shallow vessel; and therefore I was shamed for the doctrine of Lao Tzŭ."
The disciples said, "Not so. In a sixteen-foot ditch a big fish has not room to turn round; but 'tis the very place for an eel. On a six or seven-foot hillock a large beast finds no shelter, while the uncanny fox gladly makes its lair therein. Besides, ever since the days of Yao and Shun it has always been customary to honour the virtuous, advance the able, give precedence to the good and useful. Why not then among the people of Wei-lei? Let them do it, Sir."
"Come here, my children," said Kêng Sang Ch'u. "A beast big enough to swallow a cart, if it wanders alone from the hills, will not escape the sorrow of the snare. A fish big enough to gulp down a boat, if stranded on the dry shore will become a prey to ants. Therefore it is that birds and beasts love height, and fishes and turtles love depth. And the man who cares for himself hides his body. He loves the occult.
There is a play here upon words.
"As to Yao and Shun, what claim have they to praise? Their fine distinctions simply amounted to knocking a hole in a wall in order to stop it up with brambles; They had better have left the wall alone.
to combing each individual hair; to counting the grains for a rice pudding! How in the name of goodness did they profit their generation?
"If the virtuous are honoured, emulation will ensue. If knowledge be fostered, the result will be theft.
People will employ their knowledge against each other.
These things are of no use to make people good. The struggle for wealth is so severe. Sons murder their fathers; ministers their princes; men rob in broad daylight, and bore through walls at high noon. I tell you that the root of this great evil is from Yao and Shun, and that its branches will extend into a thousand ages to come. A thousand ages hence, man will be feeding upon man!"
Nan Yung Ch'u A disciple.
sadly straightened his seat and said, "But what is one of my age to do that he may attain to this?"
"Preserve your form complete," said Kêng Sang, "your vitality secure.
Let no anxious thoughts intrude. And then in three years' space you may attain to this."
"I do not know," said Nan Yung, "that there is any difference in the form of eyes; yet blind men cannot see. I do not know that there is any difference in the form of ears; yet deaf men cannot hear. I do not know that there is any difference in the form of hearts; The seat of the intellect.
yet fools cannot use theirs to any purpose. The forms are alike; yet there is something which differentiates them. One will succeed, and another will not. Yet you tell me to preserve my form complete, my vitality secure, and let no anxious thoughts intrude. But so far I only hear TAO with my ears."
"Well said!" cried Kêng Sang; and then he added, "Small wasps cannot transform huge caterpillars.
According to Chinese notions, the wasp has no young. It transforms a small caterpillar into the required offspring.
Bantams cannot hatch the eggs of geese. The fowls of Lu can. Not that there is any difference in the hatching power of chickens. One can and another cannot, because one is naturally fitted for working on a large, the other on a small scale. My talents are of the latter order. I cannot transform you. Why not go south and see Lao Tzŭ?"
So Nan Yung took some provisions, and after a seven days' journey arrived at the abode of Lao Tzŭ.
"Have you come from Kêng Sang Ch'u?" said the latter.
"I have," replied Nan Yung.
"But why," said Lao Tzŭ, "bring all these people with you?"
Meaning the questions he was going to ask.
Nan Yung looked back in alarm, and Lao Tzŭ continued, "Do you not understand what I say?"
Nan Yung bent his head abashed, and then looking up, said with a sigh, "I have now forgotten how to answer, in consequence of missing what I came to ask."
He was so confused by Lao Tzŭ's question coming before he had had time to state his mission.
"What do you mean?" said Lao Tzŭ.
"If I do not know," replied Nan Yung, "men call me a fool. If I do know, I injure myself. If I am not charitable, I injure others. If I am, I injure myself. If I do not do my duty to my neighbour, I injure others. If I do it, I injure myself. My trouble lies in not seeing how to escape from these three dilemmas. On the strength of my connection with Kêng Sang, I would venture to ask advice."
"When I saw you," said Lao Tzŭ, "I knew in the twinkling of an eye what was the matter with you. And now what you say confirms my view. You are confused, as a child that has lost its parents. You would fathom the sea with a pole. You are astray. You are struggling to get back to your natural self, but cannot find the way. Alas! alas!"
Nan Yung begged to be allowed to remain, and set to work to cultivate the good and eliminate the evil within him. At the expiration of ten days, with sorrow in his heart, he again sought Lao Tzŭ.
"Have you thoroughly cleansed yourself?" said Lao Tzŭ. "But this grieved look...There is some evil obstruction yet.
"If the disturbances are external, _Sc._ sensual.
do not be always combating them, but close the channels to the mind. If the disturbances are internal, do not strive to oppose them, but close all entrance from without.
And the mind will recover itself.
If the disturbances are both internal and external, then you will not even be able to hold fast to Tao, still less practise it."
"If a rustic is sick," said Nan Yung, "and another rustic goes to see him; and if the sick man can say what is the matter with him,--then he is not seriously ill. Yet my search after TAO is like swallowing drugs which only increase the malady.
Although really not so very far from TAO (_sc._ health) as evidenced by my being able to describe my complaint, which a man sick of some serious disease is scarcely able to do.
I beg therefore merely to ask the art of preserving life."
"The art of preserving life," replied Lao Tzŭ, "consists in being able to keep all in ONE, _Sc._ Body and soul. See the _Tao-Tê-Ching_, ch. x, where this idea has been reproduced.
to lose nothing, to estimate good and evil without divination, To know that each is bound up in the other.
to know when to stop, and how much is enough, to leave others alone and attend to oneself, to be without cares and without knowledge,--to be in fact as a child. A child will cry all day and not become hoarse,