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CONFLUENCE OF OPPOSITES
255 transmigration, the fruit of his labours was not lost and would be bis in the next rebirth, so that by means of steady work nirvana could be easily attained in the course of a few lives'.
That this simple doctrine should have puzzled the Orientalists is not surprising, because what they have read hitherto is not the scientific explanation of Religion proper, but only the disconnected mystic or, at best, speculative tenets of mythological creeds passing current as Religion.
The vanishing into the skies of Chang Tao-ling is thus described in the Introduction to the 39th volume of the SBE. (p. 42):
"Among Liang's descendants in our first ceatury was a
Kang Tao-ling, who, eschewing a career in the service of the state devoted himself to the pursuits of alchemy, and at last succeeded in compounding the grand elixir or pill, and at the age of 123 was released from the trammels of the mortal body, and entered on the enjoga
ment of immortality......" I think this is more like a secret teaching than a literal statement of a fact; and a strong hint of the emblematic nature of the teaching is conveyed in the part that refers to release from the trammels of the body, which is certainly an indication of nirvana, and opposed to the notion of a perpetuating of bodily existence by means of chemical or alchemical potions and pills.
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