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I 22
THE TEXTS OF TÂOISM.
BK. xxv.
quent years I changed my methods, ploughing deeply and carefully covering up the seed; and my harvests were rich and abundant, so that all the year I had more than I could eat. When Kwang-zze heard of his remarks, he said, “Now-adays, most men, in attending to their bodies and regulating their minds, correspond to the description of the Border-warden. They hide from themselves their Heaven(-given being); they leave (all care of) their (proper) nature; they extinguish their (proper) feelings; and they leave their spirit to die :abandoning themselves to what is the general practice. Thus dealing with their nature like the farmer who is negligent of the clods in his soil, the illegitimate results of their likings and dislikings become their nature. The bushy sedges, reeds, and rushes, which seem at first to spring up to support our bodies, gradually eradicate our nature, and it becomes like a mass of running sores, ever liable to flow out, with scabs and ulcers, discharging in flowing matter from the internal heat. So indeed it is!'
7. Po Kül was studying with Lão Tan, and asked his leave to go and travel everywhere. Lão Tan said, 'Nay ;-elsewhere it is just as here.' He repeated his request, and then Lâo Tan said, 'Where would you go first ?' 'I would begin with Khi,' replied the disciple. 'Having got there, I would go to look at the criminals (who had been executed). With my arms I would raise (one of) them up and set him on his feet, and, taking off my court robes, I would cover him with them, appealing at
1 We can only say of Po Kü that he was a disciple of Lâo-zze.
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