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Pastimes : Neocon's Seminar Thread -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Neocon who wrote (425)	4/25/2001 9:09:56 PM
From: gao seng	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 1112

When a wise scholar hears the Tao, He practices it diligently. When a mediocre scholar hears the Tao, He wavers between belief and unbelief. When a worthless scholar hears the Tao, He laughs boisterously at it. But if such a one does not laugh at it, The Tao would not be the Tao! -Tao Teh Ching (The Daode jing) So those who laugh at the laws of Nature are doomed by Nature. Those who believe yet attack Nature are doomed. There is no denying Nature's Wisdom. I think society has mechanisms to help individuals rationalize acts against Nature as being acts of good, and vice verse. But I like the quote above because it seems to say that the Tao is not for every one. Those who laugh serve a purpose, to detract the unqualified scholars from their studies. from A Man for All Seasons: "I trust I make myself obscure." --Supporting materials. When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. -- The essential Daoist philosophical and mystical beliefs can be found in the Daodejing (Tao-te Ching, Classic of the Way and Its Power), a composite text dating from about the 3rd century BC and attributed to the historical figure Laozi (Lao-tzu), and in the Zhuangzi (Chuang-tzu), a book of parables and allegories also dating from the 3rd century BC but attributed to the philosopher Zhuangzi. Whereas Confucianism urged the individual to conform to the standards of an ideal social system, Daoism maintained that the individual should ignore the dictates of society and seek only to conform with the underlying pattern of the universe, the Dao (or Tao, meaning "way"), which can neither be described in words nor conceived in thought. To be in accord with Dao, one has to "do nothing" (wuwei)-that is, nothing strained, artificial, or unnatural. Through spontaneous compliance with the impulses of one's own essential nature and by emptying oneself of all doctrines and knowledge, one achieves unity with the Dao and derives from it a mystical power. This power enables one to transcend all mundane distinctions, even the distinction of life and death. At the sociopolitical level, the Daoists called for a return to primitive agrarian life. "Daoism," Microsoft® Encarta® Encyclopedia 2000. © 1993-1999 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. --