296 L A 0-T S Z E
Finally, Ch'ien makes the remark that "Lâo-tsze was a superior man, who liked to keep in obscurity," traces the line of his posterity down to the 2d century B.C., and concludes with this important statement: – "Those who attach themselves to the doctrine of Lâo-tsze condemn that of the literati, and the literati on their part condemn Lâo-tsze, thus verifying the saying, 'Parties whose principles are different cannot take counsel together.' Lî Urh taught that transformation follows, as a matter of course, the doing nothing (to bring it about), and rectification ensues in the same way from being pure and still."
Leaving these scanty historical notes, and accepting the Tâo Teh King as the veritable work of Lâo-tsze, we must now try to give the reader some idea of its contents. Consisting, it has been seen, of not more than between five and six thousand characters, it is but a short treatise, – not half the size of our Gospel of St Mark. The nature of the subject, however, the want of any progress of thought or of logical connexion between its different parts, and the condensed style, with the mystic tendencies and poetical temperament of the author, make its meaning extraordinarily obscure, – as native scholars and Sinologists have found to their cost. Divided at first into two parts, it his subsequently and conveniently been subdivided into chapters. One of the oldest, and the most common, of these arrangements makes the chapters eighty-two.
Some Roman Catholic missionaries, nearly two centuries ago, fancied that they found a wonderful harmony between many passages and the teaching of our sacred Scriptures. Montucci of Berlin, who had adopted their views, ventured to say in 1808: – "Many things about a Triune God are so clearly expressed that no one who has read this book can doubt that the mystery of the Holy Trinity was revealed to the Chinese five centuries before the coming of Jesus Christ." Even Remusat, the first occupant of a Chinese chair in Europe, published at Paris in 1823 his Mémoire sur la Vie et les Opinions de Lâo-tsze, to vindicate the view that the Hebrew name Jehovah was phonetically represented in the fourteenth chapter by Chinese characters. These fancies were exploded by the late Stanislas Julien, when he issued in 1842 his translation of the whole treatise as Le Livre de la Voie et de la Vertu.
The most important thing is to determine what we are to understand by the Tâo, for Teh is merely its outcome, especially in man, and is rightly translated by our word virtue." Julien, we have just seen, translated Tâo by "la voie." Chalmers leaves it untranslated. "No English word," he says (p. xi), "is its exact equivalent. Three terms suggest themselves – the way, reason, and the word; but they are all liable to objection. Were we guided by etymology, 'the way' would come nearest the original, and in one or two passages the idea of a way seems to be in the term; but this is too materialistic to serve the purpose of a translation. 'Reason,' again, seems to be more like a quality or attribute of some conscious being than Tâo is. I would translate it by 'the Word,' in the sense of the Logos, but this would be like settling the question which I wish to leave open, viz., what resemblance there is between the Logos of the New Testament and this Chinese Tâo." Latterly some Sinologues in China have employed "nature" as our best analogue of the term. Thus Watters (Lâo-tsze, A Study in Chinese Philosophy, p. 45) says: – "In the Tâo Teh King the originator of the universe is referred to under the names Non-Existence, Existence, Nature (Tâo), and various designations, – all which, however, represent one idea in various manifestations. It is in all cases Nature (Tâo) which is meant." This view has been skilfully worked out; but it only hides from us the scope of "the Venerable Philosopher." "Nature" cannot be accepted as a translation of Tâo. That character was, primarily, the symbol of a way, road, or path; and then, figuratively, it was used, as we also use way, in the senses of means and method, – the course that we pursue in passing from one thing or concept to another as its end or result. It is the name of a quality. Professor Douglas has well said (Confucianism and Tâoism, p. 189): – "If we were compelled to adopt a single word to represent the Tâo of Lâo-tsze, we should prefer the sense in which it is used by Confucius, 'the way,' that is, (
Greek characters)."
What then was the quality which Lâo-tsze had in view, and which he thought of as the Tâo, – there in the library of Châu, at the pass of the valley of Han, and where he met the end of his life beyond the limits of the civilized state? It was the simplicity of spontaneity, action (which might be called non-action) without motive, free from all selfish purpose, resting in nothing but its own accomplishment. This is found in the phenomena of the material world. "All things spring up without a word spoken, and grow without a claim for their production. They go through their processes without any display of pride in them; and the results are realized without any assumption of ownership. It is owing to the absence of such assumption that the results and their processes do not disappear" (chap. ii.). It only needs the same quality in the arrangements and measures of government to make society beautiful and happy. "A government conducted by sages would free the hearts of the people from inordinate desires, fill their bellies, keep their ambitions feeble, and strengthen their bones. They would constantly keep the people without knowledge and free from desires; and, where there were those who had knowledge, they would have them so that they would not dare to put it in practice" (chap. iii.). A corresponding course observed by individual man in his government of himself becoming again "as a little child" (chaps. x. and xxviii.) will have corresponding results. "His constant virtue will be complete, and he will return to the primitive simplicity" (chap. xxviii.).
Such is the subject matter of the Tâo Teh King, – the operation of this method or Tâo, "without striving or crying," in nature, in society, and in the individual. Much that is very beautiful and practical is inculcated in connexion with its working in the individual character. The writer seems to feel that he cannot say enough on the virtue of humility (chap. viii., &c.). There were three things which he prized and held fast, – gentle compassion, economy, and the not presuming to take precedence in the world (chap. lxvii.). His teaching rises to its highest point in chap. lxiii.: – "It is the way of Tâo not to act from any personal motive, to conduct affairs without feeling the trouble of them, to taste without being aware of the flavour, to account the great as small and the small as great, to recompense injury with kindness." This last and noblest characteristic of the Tâo, the requiting "good for evil," is not touched on again in the treatise; but we know that it excited general attention at the time, and was the subject of conversation between Confucius and his disciples (Confucian Analects, xiv. 36).
What is said in the Tâo on government is not, all of it, so satisfactory. The writer shows, indeed, the benevolence of his heart. He seems to condemn the infliction of capital punishment (chaps. lxxiii. and lxxiv.), and he deplores the practice of war (chap. lxix.); but he had no sympathy with the progress of society or with the culture and arts of life. He says (chap. lxv.): – "Those who anciently were skilful in practising the Tâo did not use it to enlighten the people; their object rather was to keep them simple. The difficulty in governing the people arises from their having too much knowledge, and therefore he who tries to govern a state by wisdom is a scourge to it,
