with his concubines, spending long nights in such revelry. He did not bother about rites and ceremonies or his duties, and had a glorious time until he was slain.[1]
These two scoundrels had every pleasure in life that they wished to have. Dead, they will be branded as fools and tyrants; but they will get no reality out of that. Though reviled, they do not know it;―though praised, they do not know it; what difference is there between these two and logs of wood or clods of clay?
Those four holy men, although objects of admiration to all, suffered miseries throughout their lives and then died like everybody else. Those two scoundrels, although objects of detestation to all, enjoyed themselves throughout their lives and also died like everybody else.
CHUANG TZŬ.
4th century b.c.
[A most original thinker, of whom the Chinese nation might well be proud. Yet his writings are tabooed as heterodox, and are very widely unread, more perhaps on account of the extreme obscurity of the text than because they are under the ban of the Confucianists. What little is known of Chuang Tzŭ's life may be gathered from some of the extracts given. He is generally regarded as an advanced exponent of the doctrines of Lao Tzŭ. So late as the 4th century a.d., the work of Chuang Tzŭ appears to have run to fifty-three chapters. Of these, only thirty-three now remain; and several of them are undoubtedly spurious, while into various other chapters, spurious passages have been inserted.]
LIFE, DEATH, AND IMMORTALITY.
I.
FOUR men were conversing together, when the following resolution was suggested:―“Whosoever can make Inaction the head, Life the backbone, and Death the tail, of his existence,―that man shall be admitted to friendship with us.” The four looked at each other and smiled; and tacitly accepting the conditions, became friends forthwith.
- ↑ Defeated in battle, he perished in the flames of his own palace.
