e; as when asleep he
did not know that he was a man dreaming that he was a butterfly, so
when awake he did not know that he was not a butterfly dreaming that
he was a man. [10] But "all is embraced in the obliterating unity of
the _tao_, and the wise man, passing into the realm of the Infinite,
finds rest therein." And this _tao_, of which we hear so much in
Chinese philosophy, was before the Great Ultimate or Grand Terminus
(_t'ai chi_), and "from it came the mysterious existence of God
[_ti_]. It produced Heaven, it produced earth."

Popular Cosmogony still Personal or Dualistic

These and other cosmogonies which the Chinese have devised, though
it is necessary to note their existence in order to give a just idea
of their cosmological speculations, need not, as I said, detain us
long; and the reason why they need not do so is that, in the matter
of cosmogony, the P'an Ku legend and the _yin-yang_ system with its
monistic elaboration occupy virtually the whole field of the Chinese
mental vision. It is these two--the popular and the scientific--that
we mean when we speak of Chinese cosmogony. Though here and there a
stern sectarian might deny that the universe originated in one or the
other of these two ways, still, the general rule holds good. And I
have dealt with them in this order because, though the P'an Ku legend
belongs to the fourth century A.D., the _I ching_ dualism was not,
rightly speaking, a cosmogony until Chou Tun-i made it one by the
publication of his _T'ai chi t'u_ in the eleventh century A.D. Over
the unscientific and the scientific minds of the Chinese these two
are paramount.

Applying the general principles stated in the preceding chapter,
we find the same cause which operated to restrict the growth of
mythology in general in China operated also in like manner in this
particular branch of it. With one exception Chinese cosmogony is
non-mythological. The careful and studiously accurate historians
(whose work aimed at being _ex veritate_, 'made of truth'), the
sober literature, the vast influence of agnostic, matter-of-fact
Confucianism, supported by the heavy Mencian artillery, are
indisputable indications of a constructive imagination which grew too
quickly and became too rapidly scientific to admit of much soaring
into the realms of fantasy. Unaroused by any strong stimulus in
their ponderings over the riddle of the universe, the sober, plodding
scientists and the calm, truth-loving philosop