I tell this tale, as also that other about the exchange of hearts, partly to suggest that Liehtse's China may have had the actuality, or at least a reminiscence, of scientific knowledge since lost there, and only discovered in Europe recently. In the same way one finds references to automatic oxen, self-moving chariots, traveling by air, and a number of other things which, as we read of them, sound just like superstitious nonsense. There are old Chinese drawings of pterodactyls, and suchlike unchancey antediluvian wild fowl. Argal, (you would say) the Chinese knew of these once; although Ptero and his friends have been extinct quite a few million years, one supposes. Or was it superstition again? Then why was it not superstition in Professor So-and-so, who found the bones and reconstructed the beastie for holiday crowds to gaze upon at the Crystal Palace or the Metropolitan Museum? Knowledge does die away into reminiscence, and then into oblivion; and the chances are that Liehtse's time retained reminiscences which have since become oblivion-hidden;—then rediscovered in the West.—But I tell the tale also for a certain divergence marked in it, between Taoist and Confucian thought. Laotse would have chuckled over it, who brooded much on 'self-emptiness' as the first step towards illumination. Confucius would have allowed it; but it would not have occurred to him, unsuggested.

Now here is something still further from Confucianism; something prophetic of later Taoist developments, though it still contains Laotse's thought, and—be it said—deep wisdom.

Fan Tsu Hua was a bully and a charlatan, who by his trickery had won such hold over the king of Tsin that anyone he might recommend was surely advanced to office, and anyone he cried down would lose his all. So it was said he had magic to make the rich poor and the poor rich. He had many disciples, who were the terror of the peaceably disposed.

One day they saw an old weak man approaching, 'with weather-beaten face and clothes of no particular cut.' A chance for sport not to be neglected, they thought; and began to hustle him about in their usual fashion, 'slapping him on the back, and what not.' But he—Shang Ch'iu K'ai was his name—seemed only full of joy and serenity, and heeded nothing. Growing tired of their fun at last, they would make an end of it; and led him to the top of a high cliff. "Whoever dares throw himself over," said one of them, "will find a hundred ounces of silver," which certainly he had not had with him at the top, and none of them had put there.

It was a wonder; and still more a wonder his being unhurt; but you can make chance account for most things, and they meant to get rid of him. So they brought him to the banks of the river, saying: "A pearl of great price is here, to be had for the diving." In he went without a word, and disappeared duly; and so, thought they, their fun had come to a happy end. But no: as they turned to go, up he came, serene and smiling, and scrambled out. "Well; did you find the pearl?" they asked. "Oh yes," said Shang; "it was just as your honors said." He showed it to them; and it was indeed a pearl of great price.

Here was something beyond them; the old man, clearly, was a favorite of Fortune; Fan their master himself must deal with him. So they sent word ahead, and brought him to the palace of Fan. Who understood well the limitations of quack magic: if he was to be beaten at these tricks, where would his influence be? So he heaped up riches in the courtyard, and made a great fire all round.—"Anyone can have those things," he announced, "who will go in and get them." Shang quietly walked through the flames, and came out with his arms full; not a hair of his head was singed.

And now they were filled with consternation; they had been making a mock of Tao these years; and here evidently was a real Master of Tao, come to expose them.—"Sir," they said, "we did not know that you posessed the Secret, and were playing you tricks. We insulted you, unaware that you were a divine man. But you have leaped from the cliff, dived into the Yellow River, and walked through the flames without injury; you have shown us our stupidity, blindness, and deafness. We pray you to forgive us, and to reveal to us the Secret."

He looked at them in blank amazement.—"What is this you are telling me?" said he. "I am only old Shang Ch'iu K'ai the peasant. I heard that you, Sir, by your magic could make the poor rich. I wanted to be rich, so I came to you. I believed in you absolutely, and in all your disciples said; and so my mind was made one; I forgot my body; I saw nothing of cliffs or fire or water. But now you say you were decieving me, my soul returns to its perplexity, and my eyes and ears to their sight and hearing. What terrible dangers I have escaped! My limbs freeze with horror to think of them."

Tsai Wo, continues Liehtse, told this story to Confucius.—"Is this so strange to you?" said the latter. "The man of perfect faith can move heaven and earth, and fly to the six cardinal points without hindrance. His powers are not confined to walking in perilous places and passing through water and fire. If Shang Ch'iu K'ai, whose motive was greed and whose belief was false, found no obstacle in external things, how much more certainly will it be so when the motive is pure and both parties sincere?"

I will finish it with what is really another of Liehtse's stories,—also dealing with a man who walked through fire uninjured, unconscious of it because of the one-pointedness of his mind.