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Romanised transliteration as printed by the translator, not the original script. This is what we hold.
1In the account, for instance, of Ki 1 A brother of Shih, Si Aéh (9ze-yi and Ying-pin), wrote a remarkable commentary on the Tao Teh Xing; but it was Shih who first discredited those four Books, in his Inscription for the temple of Awang-3ze, prepared in 1078, CH. Il. INTRODUCTION. II Khang, in the nineteenth chapter of the Biographies of 3in, we havea typical Taoist brought before us. When grown up, ‘he loved Lao and Kwang;’ and a visitor, to produce the most favourable impression on him, says, ‘ Lao-3ze and Kwang Kau are my masters.’ . 9. The thirty-three Books of Kwang-3ze are divided into three Parts, called Néi, or ‘the Inner;’ W4i, or ‘ the Outer ;’ and 34, ‘the Miscellaneous.’ The first Part com- Division of the prises seven Books; the second, fifteen; and Books into three the third, eleven. ‘Inner’ may be under- Parts. stood as equivalent to esoteric or More Important. The titles of the several Books are significant, and each expresses the subject or theme of its Book. They are believed to have been prefixed by Kwang-3ze himself, and that no alteration could be made in the composition but for the worse. ‘Outer’ is understood in the sense of supplementary or subsidiary. The fifteen Books so called are ‘Wings’ to the previous seven. Their titles were not given by the author, and are not significant of the Tdoistic truth which all the paragraphs unite, or should unite, in illustrating ; they are merely some name or phrase taken from the commencement of the first paragraph in each Book,—like the names of the Books of the Confucian Analects, or of the Hebrew Pentateuch. The fixing them originally is generally supposed to have been the work of Kwo Hsiang. The eleven Miscellaneous Books are also supplementary to those of the first Part, and it is not easy to see why a difference was made between them and the fifteen that precede. 10, Kwang-3ze’s writings have long been current under the name of Nan Hwa Xan King. He was a native of The general title the duchy of Sung, born in what was then of wang-jze's_ called the district of Mang, and belonged to works. the state or kingdom of Liang or Wei. As he grew up, he filled some official post in the city of 3hiyiian,—the site of which it is not easy to determine with certainty. In A.D. 742, the name of his birth-place was changed (but only for a time) to Nan-hwa, and an imperial order was issued that Awang-3ze should thence- 12 THE TEXTS OF TAOISM. CH, It. forth be styled ‘The True Man of Nan-hwa,’ and his Book, ‘The True Book of Nan-hwa!’ To be ‘a True Man’ is the highest TAoistic achievement of a man, and our author thus canonised communicates his glory to his Book. CHAPTER III. WHAT IS THE MEANING OF THE NAME TAO? AND THE CHIEF POINTS OF BELIEF IN TAOISM.
2CHAPTER III. WHAT IS THE MEANING OF THE NAME TAO? AND THE CHIEF POINTS OF BELIEF IN TAOISM. 1. The first translation of the Tao Teh Xing into a Western language was executed in Latin by some of the Meaning of the Roman Catholic missionaries, and a copy of name Tao. it was brought to England by a Mr. Matthew Raper, F.R.S., and presented by him to the Society at a meeting on the roth January,1788,—being the gift to him of P. Jos.de Grammont, ‘ Missionarius Apostolicus, ex-Jesuita.’ In this version T4o is taken in the sense of Ratio, or the Supreme Reason of the Divine Being, the Creator and Governor. M. Abel Rémusat, the first Professor of Chinese in Paris, does not seem to have been aware of the existence of the above version in London, but his attention was attracted to Lao’s treatise about 1820, and, in 1823, he wrote of the character Tao, ‘Ce mot me semble ne pas pouvoir étre bien traduit, si ce n’est par le mot Adyos dans le triple sens de souverain Etre, de raison, et de parole.’ Rémusat’s successor in the chair of Chinese, the late Stanislas Julien, published in 1842 a translation of the whole treatise. Having concluded from an examination of it, and the earliest Taoist writers, such as K wang-jze, Hokwan 3ze, and Ho-shang Kung, that the Tao was devoid of action, of thought, of judgment, and of intelligence, he concluded that it was impossible to understand by it ‘the Primordial Reason, or the Sublime Intelligence which created, and which governs the world,’ and to * See the Khang-hst Thesaurus (OA Ml EB. ff), under He CH. III. INTRODUCTION. 13 this he subjoined the following note:—‘Quelque étrange que puisse paraitre cette idée de Lao-jze, elle n’est pas sans exemple dans Vhistoire de la philosophie. Le mot nature n’a-t-il pas été employé par certains philosophes, que la religion et la raison condamnent, pour désigner une cause premiere, également dépourvue de pensée et d’intelligence?’ Julien himself did not doubt that LAo’s idea of the character was that it primarily and properly meant ‘a way, and hence he translated the title Tao Teh King by ‘Le Livre de la Voie et de la Vertu, transferring at the same time the name T4o to the text of his version. The first English writer who endeavoured to give a distinct account of Taoism was the late Archdeacon Hardwick, while he held the office of Christian Advocate in the University of Cambridge. In his ‘ Christ and other Masters’ (vol. ii, p. 67), when treating of the religions of China, he says, ‘I feel disposed to argue that the centre of the system founded by Lao-3ze had been awarded to some energy or power resembling the “Nature” of modern speculators. The indefinite expression T4o0 was adopted to denominate an abstract cause, or the initial principle of life and order, to which worshippers were able to assign the attributes of immateriality, eternity, immensity, invisibility.’
3The indefinite expression T4o0 was adopted to denominate an abstract cause, or the initial principle of life and order, to which worshippers were able to assign the attributes of immateriality, eternity, immensity, invisibility.’ It was, probably, Julien’s reference in his note to the use of the term nature, which suggested to Hardwick his analogy between Laéo-jze’s T4o, and ‘the Nature of modern speculation.’ . Canon Farrar has said, ‘We have long personified under the name of Nature the sum total of God’s laws as observed in the physical world ; and now the notion of Nature as a distinct, living, independent entity seems to be ineradicable alike from our literature and our systems of philosophy.’ But it seems to me that this metaphorical or mythological use of the word nature for the Cause and Ruler of it, implies the previous notion of Him, that is, of God, in the mind. Does not this clearly appear in the words of Seneca ?—‘Vis illum (h.e. Jovem Deum) naturam 1 Language and Languages, pp. 184, 185. 14 ' THE TEXTS OF TAOISM, CH. III. vocare, non peccabis:—hic est ex quo nata sunt omnia, cujus spiritu vivimus 1) In his translation of the Works of AKwang-jze in- 1881, Mr. Balfour adopted Nature as the ordinary rendering of the Chinese Tao. He says, ‘When the word is translated Way, it means the Way of Nature,— her processes, her methods, and her laws; when translated Reason, it is the same as li,—the power that works in all created things, producing, preserving, and life-giving,—the intelligent principle of the world ; when translated Doctrine, it refers to the True doctrine respecting the laws and mysteries of Nature.’ He calls attention also to the point that ‘he uses NATURE in the sense of Natura naturans, while the Chinese expression wan wii (= all things) denotes Natura naturata.’ But this really comes to the metaphorical use of nature which has been touched upon above. It can claim as its patrons great names like those of Aquinas, Giordano Bruno, and Spinoza, but I have never been able to see that its barbarous phraseology makes it more than a figure of speech”. The term Nature, however, is so handy, and often fits so appropriately into a version, that if Tao had ever such a signification I should not hesitate to employ it as freely as Mr. Balfour has done; but as it has not that signification, to try to put a non-natural meaning into it, only perplexes the mind, and obscures the idea of Lao-jze. Mr. Balfour himself says (p. xviii), ‘The primary signification of Tao is simply “road.”’ Beyond question this meaning underlies the use of it by the great master of Taoism and by Awang-3ze3. Let the reader refer to the version of the twenty-fifth chapter of Lao’s treatise, and to 1 Natur. Quaest. lib. II, cap. xlv. 2 Martineau’s ‘ Types of Ethical Theory,’ I, p. 286, and his whole ‘ Conjectural History of Spinoza’s Thought.’
The source text as printed, transcribed diplomatically. Where the source language uses a non-Latin script that reaches us only through a Victorian romanisation, this layer is labelled transliteration, because that is what we hold.
Romanised transliteration as printed by the translator, not the original script. This is what we hold.
1In the account, for instance, of Ki 1 A brother of Shih, Si Aéh (9ze-yi and Ying-pin), wrote a remarkable commentary on the Tao Teh Xing; but it was Shih who first discredited those four Books, in his Inscription for the temple of Awang-3ze, prepared in 1078, CH. Il. INTRODUCTION. II Khang, in the nineteenth chapter of the Biographies of 3in, we havea typical Taoist brought before us. When grown up, ‘he loved Lao and Kwang;’ and a visitor, to produce the most favourable impression on him, says, ‘ Lao-3ze and Kwang Kau are my masters.’ . 9. The thirty-three Books of Kwang-3ze are divided into three Parts, called Néi, or ‘the Inner;’ W4i, or ‘ the Outer ;’ and 34, ‘the Miscellaneous.’ The first Part com- Division of the prises seven Books; the second, fifteen; and Books into three the third, eleven. ‘Inner’ may be under- Parts. stood as equivalent to esoteric or More Important. The titles of the several Books are significant, and each expresses the subject or theme of its Book. They are believed to have been prefixed by Kwang-3ze himself, and that no alteration could be made in the composition but for the worse. ‘Outer’ is understood in the sense of supplementary or subsidiary. The fifteen Books so called are ‘Wings’ to the previous seven. Their titles were not given by the author, and are not significant of the Tdoistic truth which all the paragraphs unite, or should unite, in illustrating ; they are merely some name or phrase taken from the commencement of the first paragraph in each Book,—like the names of the Books of the Confucian Analects, or of the Hebrew Pentateuch. The fixing them originally is generally supposed to have been the work of Kwo Hsiang. The eleven Miscellaneous Books are also supplementary to those of the first Part, and it is not easy to see why a difference was made between them and the fifteen that precede. 10, Kwang-3ze’s writings have long been current under the name of Nan Hwa Xan King. He was a native of The general title the duchy of Sung, born in what was then of wang-jze's_ called the district of Mang, and belonged to works. the state or kingdom of Liang or Wei. As he grew up, he filled some official post in the city of 3hiyiian,—the site of which it is not easy to determine with certainty. In A.D. 742, the name of his birth-place was changed (but only for a time) to Nan-hwa, and an imperial order was issued that Awang-3ze should thence- 12 THE TEXTS OF TAOISM. CH, It. forth be styled ‘The True Man of Nan-hwa,’ and his Book, ‘The True Book of Nan-hwa!’ To be ‘a True Man’ is the highest TAoistic achievement of a man, and our author thus canonised communicates his glory to his Book. CHAPTER III. WHAT IS THE MEANING OF THE NAME TAO? AND THE CHIEF POINTS OF BELIEF IN TAOISM.
2CHAPTER III. WHAT IS THE MEANING OF THE NAME TAO? AND THE CHIEF POINTS OF BELIEF IN TAOISM. 1. The first translation of the Tao Teh Xing into a Western language was executed in Latin by some of the Meaning of the Roman Catholic missionaries, and a copy of name Tao. it was brought to England by a Mr. Matthew Raper, F.R.S., and presented by him to the Society at a meeting on the roth January,1788,—being the gift to him of P. Jos.de Grammont, ‘ Missionarius Apostolicus, ex-Jesuita.’ In this version T4o is taken in the sense of Ratio, or the Supreme Reason of the Divine Being, the Creator and Governor. M. Abel Rémusat, the first Professor of Chinese in Paris, does not seem to have been aware of the existence of the above version in London, but his attention was attracted to Lao’s treatise about 1820, and, in 1823, he wrote of the character Tao, ‘Ce mot me semble ne pas pouvoir étre bien traduit, si ce n’est par le mot Adyos dans le triple sens de souverain Etre, de raison, et de parole.’ Rémusat’s successor in the chair of Chinese, the late Stanislas Julien, published in 1842 a translation of the whole treatise. Having concluded from an examination of it, and the earliest Taoist writers, such as K wang-jze, Hokwan 3ze, and Ho-shang Kung, that the Tao was devoid of action, of thought, of judgment, and of intelligence, he concluded that it was impossible to understand by it ‘the Primordial Reason, or the Sublime Intelligence which created, and which governs the world,’ and to * See the Khang-hst Thesaurus (OA Ml EB. ff), under He CH. III. INTRODUCTION. 13 this he subjoined the following note:—‘Quelque étrange que puisse paraitre cette idée de Lao-jze, elle n’est pas sans exemple dans Vhistoire de la philosophie. Le mot nature n’a-t-il pas été employé par certains philosophes, que la religion et la raison condamnent, pour désigner une cause premiere, également dépourvue de pensée et d’intelligence?’ Julien himself did not doubt that LAo’s idea of the character was that it primarily and properly meant ‘a way, and hence he translated the title Tao Teh King by ‘Le Livre de la Voie et de la Vertu, transferring at the same time the name T4o to the text of his version. The first English writer who endeavoured to give a distinct account of Taoism was the late Archdeacon Hardwick, while he held the office of Christian Advocate in the University of Cambridge. In his ‘ Christ and other Masters’ (vol. ii, p. 67), when treating of the religions of China, he says, ‘I feel disposed to argue that the centre of the system founded by Lao-3ze had been awarded to some energy or power resembling the “Nature” of modern speculators. The indefinite expression T4o0 was adopted to denominate an abstract cause, or the initial principle of life and order, to which worshippers were able to assign the attributes of immateriality, eternity, immensity, invisibility.’
3The indefinite expression T4o0 was adopted to denominate an abstract cause, or the initial principle of life and order, to which worshippers were able to assign the attributes of immateriality, eternity, immensity, invisibility.’ It was, probably, Julien’s reference in his note to the use of the term nature, which suggested to Hardwick his analogy between Laéo-jze’s T4o, and ‘the Nature of modern speculation.’ . Canon Farrar has said, ‘We have long personified under the name of Nature the sum total of God’s laws as observed in the physical world ; and now the notion of Nature as a distinct, living, independent entity seems to be ineradicable alike from our literature and our systems of philosophy.’ But it seems to me that this metaphorical or mythological use of the word nature for the Cause and Ruler of it, implies the previous notion of Him, that is, of God, in the mind. Does not this clearly appear in the words of Seneca ?—‘Vis illum (h.e. Jovem Deum) naturam 1 Language and Languages, pp. 184, 185. 14 ' THE TEXTS OF TAOISM, CH. III. vocare, non peccabis:—hic est ex quo nata sunt omnia, cujus spiritu vivimus 1) In his translation of the Works of AKwang-jze in- 1881, Mr. Balfour adopted Nature as the ordinary rendering of the Chinese Tao. He says, ‘When the word is translated Way, it means the Way of Nature,— her processes, her methods, and her laws; when translated Reason, it is the same as li,—the power that works in all created things, producing, preserving, and life-giving,—the intelligent principle of the world ; when translated Doctrine, it refers to the True doctrine respecting the laws and mysteries of Nature.’ He calls attention also to the point that ‘he uses NATURE in the sense of Natura naturans, while the Chinese expression wan wii (= all things) denotes Natura naturata.’ But this really comes to the metaphorical use of nature which has been touched upon above. It can claim as its patrons great names like those of Aquinas, Giordano Bruno, and Spinoza, but I have never been able to see that its barbarous phraseology makes it more than a figure of speech”. The term Nature, however, is so handy, and often fits so appropriately into a version, that if Tao had ever such a signification I should not hesitate to employ it as freely as Mr. Balfour has done; but as it has not that signification, to try to put a non-natural meaning into it, only perplexes the mind, and obscures the idea of Lao-jze. Mr. Balfour himself says (p. xviii), ‘The primary signification of Tao is simply “road.”’ Beyond question this meaning underlies the use of it by the great master of Taoism and by Awang-3ze3. Let the reader refer to the version of the twenty-fifth chapter of Lao’s treatise, and to 1 Natur. Quaest. lib. II, cap. xlv. 2 Martineau’s ‘ Types of Ethical Theory,’ I, p. 286, and his whole ‘ Conjectural History of Spinoza’s Thought.’
The source text as printed, transcribed diplomatically. Where the source language uses a non-Latin script that reaches us only through a Victorian romanisation, this layer is labelled transliteration, because that is what we hold.
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