The Three Principle Texts of Daoism translated by ... - Bad Request

the fact that his own body is an illusion, we are reducedto the absurdity of an illusion studying an illusion."Lao Ch'êng Tzu returned home, and for three monthspondered deeply over the words of the Venerable YinWên. Subsequently, he had the power of appearing ordisappearing at will; he could reverse the order of thefour seasons, produce thunderstorms in winter and ice insummer, make flying things creep and creeping thingsfly. But to the end of his days he never published thesecret of his art, so that it was not handed down to aftergenerations.Pure men are without bad dreamsMASTER LIEH said: “A dream is something thatcomes into contact with the mind; an external event issomething that impinges on the body. Hence ourfeelings by day and our dreams by night are the result ofcontacts made by mind or body. it follows that if we canconcentrate the mind in abstraction, our feelings and ourdreams will vanish of themselves. Those who rely ontheir waking perceptions will not argue about them.Those who put faith in dreams do not understand theprocesses of change in the external world.“The pure men of old passed their waking existence inself-oblivion, and slept without dreams. How can this bedismissed as an empty phrase?”