The Nameless - Taoist Mysticism
The Nameless - Taoist Mysticism
The Nameless - Taoist Mysticism
The Nameless:
Taoist Mysticism
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also called it the Mother of Heaven and Earth. It was from concern for
others that the sage, ruefully aware of the limitations of words and
concepts, went so far as to disregard his own dictum by writing a fivethousand-word treatise; the same compassion impelled his spiritual
descendants the Chan (Zen) Masters and their admirers those
staunch upholders of the wordless doctrine
- to produce whole volumes of explanations and pithy aphorisms.
Unbroken silence, like using sacred images for fuel on a winters
night, is altogether too extreme. All the same, the difficulty of finding
words just to discuss ideas about the ineffable, to say nothing of trying
to describe it, is truly formidable. Semantically, traps abound;
conceptually, chasms yawn. Each assertion threatens to thicken the
primordial mist instead of shedding light. To speak in terms of is and
is not, of laudable and otherwise, is surely the antithesis of a canny
approach to the non-dual Tao, but how else is one to speak at all ?
To take just one example. In rendering the famous sentence from
the Tao Te Ching as The name which can be named is not the
Eternals name rather than employing the more usual, but
meaningless translation eternal name, I have inadvertently set up an
entity, the Eternal. This naturally is a synonym for the Tao, but it
attributes the quality of eternity to that which is beyond all qualities
and pairs of opposites. God is a still less appropriate synonym,
conveying as it does the idea of a being rather than a state and, what is
worse, of a creator standing apart from his creation. The Ultimate or
Ultimate Reality is not much better, since it suggests something lying
beyond the world of form rather than a One that is identical with and
inseparable from the multiplicity of its creations. No wonder Lao-tzu
preferred to call it the Nameless!
Chinese mystics (Taoist and Buddhist) are not alone in recogni- 1 zing
that perception of the Nameless is a wholly intuitive experience
demanding such vivid and immediate awareness that the thinker and
his thought, the beholder and the beheld, are one. Knowledge,
discrimination, logic, analysis, reason and every variety of conceptual
thought must be banished. None of them will serve. Therefore the
need for perfect stillness, outside and in. Without, there must be no
boundaries, the mind being free to penetrate all objects and perceive
their interfusion; within, self- consciousness must be annihilated. The
fruit of such intuition is
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faiths, I am inclined to think that Lao and Chuang (like the friend
whose words I have quoted), differed from these others in one of two
ways. Either their experience was less intense, a series of intuitions that
fell short of ultimate illumination, or else they did not draw (or
thought it best not to reveal) certain awe-inspiring implications. To all
appearances, those sages had no special goal beyond achieving the
joyous serenity and absolute freedom that follow from becoming
cheerfully indifferent to the most cruel blows which fate may hold in
store. They did not insist that failure to achieve conscious union with
the Tao prior to death might have tragic consequences.
In tracing the development of Taoist mysticism, one is bound to
begin with Lao and Chuang. Since there are no authentic texts
covering the two-and-a-half millennia separating them from the
Yellow Emperor, one docs not know the extent to which their
predecessors anticipated their doctrine of mystical intuition. The art of
wood-block printing had yet to be invented and no manuscripts
penned by earlier mystics survive, unless one counts those fragments
attributed to the Yellow Emperor which are concerned not with
doctrine but with yogic method. zX Typical of Lao-tzus mystical
aphorisms are the following:
" There is something that arose from chaos before the world was bom.
Silent and invisible, it exists of itself, unchanging. Penetrating
everywhere, it never ceases. One may deem it the Mother of the World.
Not knowing its name, I call it the Tao. If pushed to describe it, I
should say it is big; yes, big and flowing; flowing and far-reaching, farreaching and (yet) returning.
The world had an antecedent that can be called its Mother.
Knowing the Mother, you will come to know the child. Knowing the
child, go back and hold fast to the Mother, then all your life you will be
secure.
Non-being is the name given to the source of the worlds beginning.
Being is the name given to the Mother of the Myriad Objects. Yet are
these fundamentally one, differing only in name. Therefore let desire
be stilled while you contemplate the Mystery; while desires reign, you
behold (only) its outward manifestations.
(Non-being and being) - these two are fundamentally the same,
though different in name. Their sameness is what one calls a mystery.
Mystery upon mystery-such is the gateway to all secrets.
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forth at length does not necessarily point to great differences of viewpoint, as a short work and a reasonably long one are not altogether
comparable. Still, on the face of it, it does appear that, whereas Laotzu contented himself with extolling the majesty of the Tao, as a nothing - utterly sublime, constant and eternal- Chuang-tzu gave more
thought to the means of winning accord with it, though both agree that
the prime necessity is the elimination of dualistic thought. Since
opposites belong together, to cleave to one and abhor the other is
plainly absurd. Fame and shame, wealth and want, life and death
come and go turn by turn, so why make distinctions? How much
better to accord freely with the Tao by accepting each transformation
with undisturbed equanimity. Longing to be other than one is implies
rejection of identity with the ever-changing, always constant Tao,
whereas recognition of that identity banishes fear as well as
disappointment; disaster does not exist for a man who cheerfully
accepts the inevitability of unceasing change in his condition,
sustained by his knowledge of that ultimate transcendence over
change which is inherent in his being inseparable from the Tao.
Chuang-tzu, in enjoining glad acceptance of whatever may befall,
was not advocating mere fortitude. For him, there was no question of
stem submission to misfortune; what was needed was the wisdom to
understand that every kind of up and down is as necessary to natures
pattern as are sunshine and storm, and that the pattern taken as a
whole is perfect. He would have had no patience with a man who,
standing amidst the smiling fields of summer, talked nostalgically of
moon-lit snow, or who bemoaned the drabness of winter while
amusingly grotesque silhouettes of naked branches were there to be
enjoyed. Viewing all opposites as two parts of a whole, Chuang-tzu
saw in death so little cause for tears that he was found singing and
beating a dram during the obsequies of his wife, a lady of whom he
had been genuinely fond!
Weakness and softness-as of water, infants, females-were qualities
he extolled, perceiving that it is by yielding to circumstances that one
conquers. He could see no sense in striving to grasp what lies out of
reach or clutching at what is already on its way out. As to those woes
which no philosophical or mystical insight can banish altogether, such
as extreme want or mortal danger, his prescription for guarding
against them was to be in- 188
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may be said to have entered Heaven . . . Let his spirit ascend and
mount upon the light; with his bodily form he dissolves and is gone.
As to the more ascetic and acrobatic forms of yoga, they seem to
have aroused Chuang-tzus scorn. Speaking of Induction (to use
Waleys rendering of the name of a contemporary school of yoga), he
declares: To pant, to puff, to hale, to sip, to spit out the old breath
and draw in the new, practising bear-hang- ings and birdstretchings, longevity their only concern - such is the life favoured by
scholars who favour Induction. Nevertheless, Chuang-tzu has
traditionally been credited by the exponents of the internal alchemy
with having been one of their number, for he remarks in one passage
that the True Man breathes with his heels. This has been taken by
some to indicate his familiarity with a particular method of yogic
breathing to which I referred in Chapter 4; however, others aver that
the exercise was introduced much later by yogins who found it
advantageous to employ a chance phrase culled from Chuang-tzus
work as a sort of scriptural authority.
The fact that the yogic theory and practice known to the early sages
had a great deal in common with Indian yoga led Waley to assume
that, even as far back as the third century B.C., Indian influence had
somehow made itself felt in China; but, to one familiar with the
development of mysticism throughout the world, it seems unnecessary
to stretch the imagination that far. It is observable that contcmplatives
belonging to many faiths have often arrived independently at rather
similar methods of wresting the treasure from the secret store-house
in the mind.
If, on the doubtful assumption that the views of each of the two
sages are fully represented in their respective works, we take it that
Chuang-tzus cultivation of intuition by yogic methods was a step
forward from Lao-tzus quietism, we must still regard Chuang-tzus
teaching as an archaic form of mysticism because of his seeming lack
of concern with achieving death-transcending union with the One.
However, the matter cannot be judged with any certainty, as his
utterances on death, some of which are quoted in my chapter on
philosophy, vary so widely in their implications. There is a
particularly macabre passage suggesting that he regarded the
tranquillity of the grave as the most admirable form of serenity. In it
he relates a fanciful conversation with a skull 190
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which pours scorn upon the notion of returning to life. Said the skull:
Among the dead there are no rulers above, no subjects below and no
chores of the four seasons. Wrinkling its brow it added: Why should
I throw away more happiness than kings enjoy? Against this, the
sages putting into Lao Tans (Lao-tzus) mouth the words: Why
dont you make him see that life and death are the same story ? can be
taken in two senses - that there is a sequel to what is commonly termed
death or that there being none just does not matter. Then there is the
passage, How do I know that in hating death I am not like a man who,
having left home in his youth, has forgotten the way back? This could
be taken to imply belief in a very desirable state of existence beyond
the grave, but could equally be regarded as mere speculation
analogous to the passage in which the sage, awakening from a dream
of being a butterfly, speculates as to whether or not he is now a
butterfly dreaming of being a man. On the other hand, the passage
Some day there will be a great awakening when we shall know this Ls
all a dream very strongly suggests belief in a blissful state to come.
Perhaps the key to the enigma is contained in the words That which
kills life does not die; that which gives life does not live. Interpreted in
a mystical sense, this means that individual beings are mere shadows
with no lives of their own, mere waves in the eternal ocean that lies
beyond the dualism of life and death. This would accord with the
Mahayana Buddhist philosophy that, in an ultimate sense, there are no
beings to enter Nirvana, nor anything that has ever been apart from it.
Yet, even if we accept the very likely hypothesis that Chuang-tzu and
the Buddhist mystics were pointing to exactly the same truth, there
remains a difference of approach. With Chuang-tzG there is no
urgency to make sure of reaching the transcendental goal, no impulse
to carry the fortress by storm. It is as though he were content to let
the future take care of itself, content with having won the freedom that
arises from serene dispassion. He does not seem to share the concern of
later Taoist mystics about the fading into nothingness of the hun and
po souls of those who die without having experienced mystical
intuition. Can it be that he assumes that everyone, whether conscious
of the Tao or not, will be reabsorbed at death into its formlessness and
thus share perpetually in its vast consciousness? It is more likely, I
think, that he implies the non-existence of beings who seemingly live
and die; in other
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words, all that really lives in each of us is the undying Tao, which each
wrongly takes to be a separate entity belonging to or constituting
himself. There is no way of knowing for sure. Unless we postulate that
Lao and Chuang kept back certain teachings, believing it unwise or
unnecessary to commit them to words, their philosophy, because of its
focus on the proper living of this very life - the Here and Now - might
reasonably be called mystical humanism. Though it falls short of
certain later developments, it offers a very pleasant and at the same
time admirable philosophy of life. The qualities to be looked for in its
exponents include: quiet acceptance of the twists and turns of fate; a
disinclination to interfere; a warm affection for beings both beautiful
and ugly, arising from the perception of natures seamless unity; a
comfortable absence of self-consciousness and a spontaneity which,
besides being delightful in itself, might beget rare skill in performing
tasks involving co-ordination of hand and eye - Chuang-tzu was fond
of relating stories about chefs, wood-cutters, carpenters, wheelwrights and so on to illustrate this point. As simple frugality and
distaste for ostentation would preclude any thirst for luxuries and
expensive novelties, pleasure in simple things would be all the keener;
moreover, feeling a zestful interest in everything that could possibly
happen would certainly prohibit boredom. A man thus trained would
be loved and valued by his friends, because never in the way; his inner
happiness would prove infectious. Even in those relatively prosaic
terms, his lot could be described as enviable, to say nothing of the
likelihood of his being able to enter at will into the bliss discoverable
in the secret chamber of the mind.
The other literary sources from which we might hope to gain
information about Taoist mysticism in its earlier days - the works
ascribed to Kuan-tzu, Han Fei-tzu and Lieh-tzu for example - are so
widely regarded as later compilations of material of varying and
uncertain date that it is difficult to deduce any worthwhile conclusions
from them or to put them into proper historical sequence. In the Huai
Nan-tzQ, written several centuries later, some attempt is made to
analyse the works of the Tao in terms of the interaction of yin and
yang the positive and negative principles. A school of Taoism much
concerned with the yin and yang grew up and so did another which
associated its teachings intimately with the I Ching (Book of Change),
but neither of these 192
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Tseng Lao-weng, that I gained the highest insight that can ever be
vouchsafed to a person of such ordinary attainments as my own. I
recall his revelation with gratitude and awe. It stemmed from an
experience so close to the heart of things that whether or not his
exposition is held to reflect Buddhist influence matters not at all; for,
beyond a certain level, all such distinctions fade. His belief in
transfiguration leading to total absorption in the Tao was subscribed to
by innumerable Taoists who were certainly not conscious of having
inherited a mixed tradition, since it had been transmitted from one
Taoist adept to another over a space of many centuries. I shall relate
the story in detail, as being at once dramatic and fully representative of
Taoist mysticism in its most developed stage. What I came upon so
unexpectedly includes a fair sample of the teaching given to Taoist
adepts in my day; its blend of humour and sincerity has such an
authentically Taoist stamp that it would not be too far-fetched to find
in it echoes of Chuang-tzu and the Ch'an (Zen) Masters, even though it
dealt with a type of mystical experience that goes far beyond simple
mystical humanism.
That the Master known as Tseng Lao-weng spoke from direct
knowledge conferred by full illumination strikes me as unquestionable;
for, though I do not possess the high intuitive powers required for
detecting an adept who has reached the goal, Tseng Lao-wengs
presence conferred a direct communication of bliss from heart to heart
that was all the more remarkable in view of my own unadvanced state.
The year was 1947 and the place not a great monastery, nor even a
hermitage in the ordinary sense, but a house in the northwestern
precinct of Peking inhabited by less than half-a-dozen Taoists.
Towards the end of World War II, they had been driven from their
mountain retreat by guerrilla operations conducted by Chinese
partizans against the Japanese invaders. Though, as refugees, the
recluses adhered to the regimen to which they had been accustomed,
they had exchanged their distinctive costume for the silk or cotton
gowns worn by Peking laymen in those days, so as to avoid unwelcome
attention. Since the end of the war, conditions in the countryside being
too disturbed to permit a return to their hermitage, they had clung to
their temporary refuge, not even bothering to acquire Taoist robes to
replace those discarded when danger threatened. Probably their
neighbours
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one sitting closest to the further wall was an elderly person, for parts
of a luxuriant white beard were visible on either side of his face. Clad
in a laymans gown of coarse grey cloth, he had drawn up his hair in a
bun and concealed it beneath a home-made cap of soft black material.
His companions sat behind him and at a distance from each other, so
that the three meditation-cushions formed the points of an equilateral
triangle; this, I believe, had no esoteric significance, but was simply an
arrangement that gave each meditator ample space. The younger men
wore the high- necked gowns of wadded dark-blue silk that formed the
winter garb of prosperous Peking merchants in those days; their closecropped heads were bare like those of laymen; nevertheless one could
sense that they were no amateurs at the art of meditation. There was
no ikon to be seen, but smoke curled from a single stick of incense set
in an antique tripod that stood to one side of the bearded figure.
As no one showed any awareness of my presence, I sat down crosslegged behind them, taking care to make no noise. The wooden floor
was cold, but to have sat in a chair - and thus at a higher level than the
recluses - would have been discourteous. Thirsty and tired, I hoped the
meditation period would soon be over. To pass the time I studied a
peculiarly fascinating wall- scroll, an ink-painting depicting a Taoist
immortal making his way across an ice-bound river to a pavilion
standing amidst a grove of snow-covered cedars. Executed with a
masterly economy of brush-strokes, it suggested rather than portrayed
this scene and yet presented it more vividly than a meticulously
detailed oil- painting could have done. That the traveller was an
immortal was apparent not from his costume but from his seeming to
sweep forward with irresistible power, serenely unhampered by
slippery, cracked ice or treacherous snow-drifts. I had seldom seen a
painted figure so marvellously imbued with life. But gradually my
interest in the picture waned, for I discovered with some surprise that
inexplicable sensations of buoyancy and well-being had driven away
both boredom and fatigue. Presently they became so intense that, had I
had anything to eat or drink since those little cupfuls of peach brandy
whose effect had worn off hours before, I should have suspected
someone of doctoring it with some sort of euphoric drug. As it was, no
one seemed aware of my presence, and even the longed-for cup of tea
had not materialized. I cannot hope to
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coming. You must think us remiss to keep you waiting so long for
refreshment after your cold journey all the way from the White Cloud
Monastery.
I drew in my breath. Grinning puckishly as though amused at my
regarding telepathy as a matter for astonishment, he motioned me to a
chair and took one separated from mine by the width of a table just
broad enough to accommodate the two bowls of pale-green tea now
served by one of his disciples. The effect of this proximity was to
restore something of the joyous serenity I had felt earlier, the
difference in intensity being no doubt attributable to his having
descended from the incalculably exalted level of consciousness attained
during meditation.
So kind of you to have hurried over.
Hurried over ? Indeed I had, but as my visit to the White Cloud
Monastery had been made on an impulse, my friend there could not
possibly have told the old gentleman to expect me that afternoon, and
there was no obvious reason for the latters knowing from where and
at what speed I had come. Not for the first or last time in my life, I felt
uncomfortable in the face of a prescience that makes ones thoughts
seem visible.
I should have hastened to pay my respects much sooner, but for
Gracefully he waved his hand. No apologies. You came as soon as
you could.
Clutching at a simpler explanation, namely that he had been
expecting some other visitor from the White Cloud Monastery, I
blurted out: Venerable, are you quite sure you know who I
am?
That, no! he exclaimed, eyes crinkling with amusement. Such
knowledge would be miraculous, wouldnt it ? Does one ever know
that much even about himself? If you can tell me truly that you know
who you are, I must bow down to you as my Teacher.
Please, Venerable! I answered blushing. I was speaking in a
conventional sense. My insignificant name in its Chinese form is Pu
Lo-tao and my humble cognomen Chu-feng. Perhaps you were
expecting ---------------
I was expecting Pu Lo-tao and Pu Ix>-tao is here. Thats all that
matters. I, as you may know, am the person generally called Tseng
Lao-weng, so we need no further introduction. Another few days and
you would have found us gone to Hangchow, as one
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men who are students of the Way. It must be disappointing for you.
Do not blame Yang Tao-shih, Venerable. He wished only to make
me see for myself that Buddhists do not have a monopoly of wisdom.
And does seeing an old man distinguished by nothing more than an
unusually bushy beard convince you that they do not?
What could I say that would not sound like flattery, which he
obviously disliked? Venerable, it is just that, as most of my teachers
are Buddhist, I am ignorant about what Taoists mean by such terms as
wisdom and illumination, and about their methods of approaching the
Tao.
He laughed. How strange. Can there be two kinds of wisdom, two
kinds of illumination, Taoist and Buddhist? Surely the experience of
truth must be the same for all? As to approaching the Tao, be sure that
demons and executioners, let alone Buddhists, are as close to it as can
be. The one impossible thing is to get a fingers breadth away from it.
Do you suppose that some people - this old fellow, for example - are
nearer to it than others ? Is a bird closer to the air than a tortoise or a
cat? The Tao is closer to you than the nose on your face; it is only
because you can tweak your nose that you think otherwise. Asking
about our approach to the Tao is like asking a deep-sea fish how it
approaches the water. It is just a matter of recognizing what has been
inside, outside and all around from the first. Do you understand ?
Yes, I believe I do. Certainly my Buddhist teachers have taught me
that there is no attaining liberation, but only attaining recognition of
what one has always been from the first.
Excellent, excellent! Your teachers, then, are true sages. You are a
worthy disciple, so why brave the bitter cold to visit an ordinary old
fellow ? You would have learnt as much at your own fireside. (His
harping so much on his being just an ordinary old fellow was not due
to exaggerated modesty, being a play on the words of which his title,
Lao-weng, was composed.)
Venerable, please dont laugh at me! I accept your teaching that
true sages have but the one goal. Still, here in China, there ye
Buddhists and there are also Taoists. Manifestly they differ; since the
goal is one, the distinction must lie in their methods of approach.
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So you are hungry not for wisdom but for knowledge! What a pity!
Wisdom is almost as satisfying as good millet-gruel, whereas
knowledge has less body to it than tepid water poured over old tealeaves; but if that is the fare you have come for, I can give you as
much as your mistreated belly will hold. What i^, sort of old tea-leaves
do Buddhists use, I wonder! We Taoists use all sorts. Some swallow
medicine-balls as big as pigeons eggs or drink tonics by the jugful,
live upon unappetizing diets, take baths at intervals governed by
esoteric numbers, breathe in and out like asthmatic dragons, or jump
about like Manchu bannermen hardening themselves for battle - all
this discomfort just for the sake of a few extra decades of lifeJ And
why? To gain more time to find what has never been lost! And what of
those pious recluses who rattle mallets against wooden-fish drums
from dusk to dawn, groaning out liturgies like cholera-patients
excreting watery dung ? They are penitents longing to rid themselves
of a burden they never had. These people do everything imaginable,
including > swallowing pills made from the vital fluids secreted by the
opposite sex and lighting fires in their bellies to make the alchemic
cauldrons boil - everything, everything except - sit still and look within. I shall have to talk of such follies for hours, if you really want a full
list of Taoist methods. These method-users resemble mountain
streams a thousand leagues from the sea. Ah, how they chatter and
gurgle, bubble and boil, rush and eddy, plunging over precipices in
spectacular fashion! How angrily they pound against the boulders and
suck down their prey in treacherous whirl-pools! But, as the streams
broaden, they grow quieter and more purposeful. They become rivers
- ah, how calm, how silent! How majestically they sweep towards their
goal, giving no impression of swiftness and, as they near the ocean,
seeming not to move at all! While noisy mountain streams are
reminiscent of people chattering about the Tao and showing-off
spectacular methods, rivers remind one of experienced men, taciturn,
doing little, but doing it decisively; outwardly still, yet sweeping
forward faster than you know. Your teachers have offered you
wisdom; then why waste time acquiring knowledge? Methods!
Approaches! Need the junk-master steering towards the sea, with the
sails of his vessel billowing in the wind, bother his head about
alternative modes of propulsion - oars, paddles, punt-poles, tow-ropes,
engines and all the rest? Any sort of vessel, unless it founders or
pitches you
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overboard, is good enough to take you to the one and only sea. Now do
you understand ?
Indeed I did, though not with a direct understanding firmly rooted
in intuitive experience that matched his own; but I pretended to be at a
loss, hoping his voice, never far from laughter, would go on and on and
on; for, just as his mind when lost in the bliss of meditation had
communicated a measure of its joy, so now it was emanating a warmth,
a jollity that made me want to laugh, to sing, to dance, to shout aloud
that every thing is forever as it should be, provided we now and then
remember to rub our eyes. I could have sat contentedly listening to
him hour after hour, day after day. Overwhelmed with love and
admiration only partly inspired by his words, I did not guess that he
had yet a still more precious gift for me, one that would remain when
the magic of his presence was withdrawn, the very secret that had been
denied me by the Abbot of the Valley Spirit Hermitage, who had held
the mystery too sacred to be lightiy revealed.
Tseng Lao-wengs talk of rivers flowing into the ocean had put me
in mind of Sir Edwin Arnolds lovely expression of the mystery of
Nirvana, the dew-drop slips into the shining sea, which I had long
accepted as a poetical description of that moment when the seemingindividual, at last free from the shackles of the ego, merges with the
Tao the Void. This I knew to be an intensely blissful experience, but
it was Tseng Lao-weng who now revealed its shining splendour in
terms that made my heart leap. Afterwards I wondered whether Sir
Edwin Arnold himself had realized the full purport of his words. At a
certain moment in our conversation when Tseng Lao-weng paused
expectantly, I translated the beautiful line for him and was rewarded
by a smile of pleasure and surprise. Eyes glowing, he replied :
My countrymen are wrong to speak of the Western Ocean People
as barbarians. Your poets simile is penetrating - exalted ! And yet it
does not capture the whole; for, when a lesser body of water enters a
greater, though the two are thenceforth inseparable, the smaller
constitutes but a fragment of the whole. But consider the Tao, which
transcends both finite and infinite. Since the Tao is All and nothing lies
outside it, since its multiplicity and unity are identical, when a finite
being sheds the illusion of separate existence, he is not lost in the Tao
likr a dew- drop merging with the sea; by casting off his imaginary
limita
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