Taoist Philosophy - Conversations V

[Marblehead]

Confucius went to see Lao Tan and the latter had just come out of a bath. He was spreading his hair to dry and he looked lifeless as a corpse. Confucius stood aside waiting for him. After a while he said, “Are my eyes deceiving me, or is it true? Just now, Master, you looked like the dry stump of a tree, standing there alone, like a thing from which the Spirit has departed.”

“I was meditating on the origin of the Universe.”

“What do you mean?” said Confucius.

“It is a problem that defies the mind and language. I’ll try to tell you what it is like approximately. The great Yin is majestically silent; the great Yang is impressively active. Majestic silence comes from Heaven, and impressive activity comes from the Earth. When the two meet and merge, all things are formed. Some can see the connection, but cannot see their form. Growth alternates with decay, fullness with exhaustion, darkness with light. Every day things change and every month they are transformed. You see what is going on every day and observe that the change is imperceptible. Life comes from a source and death is but a return to it. Thus beginning follows the end in a continual endless cycle. Without Tao, what can be the generative principle binding on all?”

“May I share in your spiritual wanderings?” asked Confucius.

“One who attains Tao sees perfect beauty and feels perfect happiness”, replied Lao Tan. “To see perfect beauty and feel perfect happiness is left for the perfect one.”

“Can you speak more in detail?” asked Confucius.

And Lao Tan replied, “The vegetarian animals do not mind changing their feeding ground. Insects that live in water do not mind change of water. That is because the changes are minor and do not affect their vital needs. Happiness and anger, joys and sorrows, should not enter one’s breast, for this Universe represents the unity of all things. When one perceives this unity and is united with it, he regards his bodily form as dust of the Earth, and the cycle of life and death but as the alteration of day and night. He cannot be disturbed by such accidents, much less by the occurrences of fortune and misfortune. He shakes off an official position as he shakes off dirt, knowing that his self is more precious than rank. His aim is to keep his self without allowing it to become lost in external changes. For the process of change going on in all things is continuous and endless. Why should one let one’s mind be troubled by it? One who knows Tao will understand this.”

“Master, your character is comparable to the Heaven and Earth”, said Confucius, “and yet even you depend on words of wisdom to cultivate your heart. What ancient men could do without such (self-cultivation)?”

“You’re wrong there”, said Lao Tan. “Look at the water coming out of a spring, it flows naturally of itself. The perfect man does not have to cultivate his character and yet he never departs from the laws of Nature. It is like the sky which is high by Nature, like the Earth which is solid by Nature and like the sun and the moon which are bright by themselves. What do they do to cultivate themselves?”

Confucius left and said to Yen Huei, “In the matter of Tao I am just like a gnat. If the Master had not enlightened my darkness, I would not be aware of the great scheme of the Universe.”

Edited March 2, 2013 by Marblehead

[MassTaoism]

[fatguyslim]

Which text is this from?

[deci belle]

[Marblehead]

Which text is this from?

 

All these "Conversations" are from Lin Yutang's "The Wisdom of Laotse" first printed in 1948 by 'The Modern Library' (Random House, Inc.)

 

It is available used from Amazon.com

[Marblehead]

[Otis]

However, to not belittle the need for 'cultivation' not many of us are perfect so we do need to cultivate in order to return to our true nature, whatever that is.

Of course, it does suggest a different kind of cultivation, than what we usually think of as self-improvement (outside-in). More and more practice of artificiality will not bring us to naturalness, after all.

 

Rather than cultivate to become perfect, and then start being natural, we can look at "what's perfect" as "what is". So the cultivation can be merely the practice of being natural, allowing the moment to sweep us along perfectly with it.

[stan herman]

Of course, it does suggest a different kind of cultivation, than what we usually think of as self-improvement (outside-in). More and more practice of artificiality will not bring us to naturalness, after all.

 

Rather than cultivate to become perfect, and then start being natural, we can look at "what's perfect" as "what is". So the cultivation can be merely the practice of being natural, allowing the moment to sweep us along perfectly with it.

 

Can it be any other way? Even when I strive--for riches, status, glory or enlightenment, aren't the forces of the moment at work? When we say 'being natural' can that mean other than allow the mind to quiet, as best you can, before proceeding?

[Marblehead]

Of course, ...

 

I had to give you a point for that.