"It is concentration," replied the man. "When twenty years old, I took to forging swords. I cared for nothing else. If a thing was not a sword, I did not notice it. I availed myself of whatever energy I did not use in other directions in order to secure greater efficiency in the direction required. Still more of that which is never without use;—
Tao.
So that there was nothing which did not lend its aid.
Jen Ch'iu asked Confucius, saying, "Can we know about the time before the universe existed?"
"We can," replied Confucius. "Time was of old precisely what it is now."
At this rebuff, Jen Ch'iu withdrew. Next day he again visited Confucius and said, "Yesterday when I asked you that question and you answered me, I was quite clear about it. To-day I am confused. How is this?"
"Your clearness of yesterday," answered Confucius, "was because my answer appealed direct to your natural intelligence. Your confusion of to-day results from the intrusion of something other than the natural intelligence.
You have passed from "simple apprehension" to "judgment."