Gems of Chinese Literature/Chuang Tzŭ-Archery

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Gems of Chinese Literature
translated by Herbert Allen Giles

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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.]

1518638Gems of Chinese Literature — ArcheryHerbert Allen GilesChuang Tzŭ

Lieh Yü-k'ou instructed Poh-hun Wu-jên in archery. Drawing the bow to its full, he [the teacher] placed a cup of water on his elbow and began to let fly. Hardly was one arrow out of sight ere another was on the string, the archer all the time standing like a statue. Poh-hun Wu-jên cried out, “This is shooting under ordinary conditions; it is not shooting under extraordinary conditions. Now I will ascend a high mountain with you, and stand on the edge of a precipice a thousand feet in depth, and see if you can shoot like this then.” Thereupon Wu-jên went with his teacher up a high mountain, and stood on the edge of a precipice a thousand feet high, approaching it backwards until one-fifth of his feet overhung the chasm, when he beckoned Lieh Yü-k'ou to come on. But Yü-k'ou had fallen prostrate on the ground, with the sweat pouring down to his heels.