d down and the
plan marked out; there is no cartography of cosmogenesis; . . .
but seeds of meditation are sown. Of course, it is meaningless
nonsense for the mind to which all metaphysics and abstract
thought are meaningless nonsense. Mystics, however, will see in
it an attempt to put the Unutterable into words. One paragraph
may be quoted:

"There is life, and That which produces life; form, and That
which imparts form; sound, and That which causes color; taste,
and That which causes taste. The source of life is death; but
That which produces life never comes to an end."

Remember the dying Socrates: 'life comes from death, as death
from life.' We appear, at birth, out of that Unseen into which
we return at death, says Liehtse; but that which produces life,
--which is the cause of this manifestation (you can say, the
Soul),--is eternal.

"The origin of form is matter; but That which imparts form has
no material existence."

No; because it is the down-breathing spirit entering into
matter; matter being the medium through which it creates, or to
which it imparts, form. "The form to which the clay is modeled
is first united with"--or we may say, projected from--"the
potter's mind."

"The genesis of sound lies in the sense of hearing; but That
which causes sound is never audible to the ear. The source of
color"--for 'source' we might say, the 'issuing-point'--"is
vision; but That which produces color never manifests to the
eye. The origin of taste lies in the palate; but That which
causes taste is never perceived by that sense. All these
pehnomena are functions of the Principle of Inaction--the inert
unchanging Tao."

One is reminded of a passage in the _Talavakara-Upanishad:_

"That which does not speak by speech, but by which speech is
expressed: That alone shalt thou know as Brahman, not that which
they here adore.

"That which does not think by mind, but by which mind is itself
thought: That alone shalt thou know as Brahman, not that which
they here adore."

And so it continues of each of the sense-functions.

After this, Liehtse for the most wanders from story to story; he
taught in parables; and sometimes we have to listen hard to
catch the meaning of them, he rarely insists on it, or drives it
well home, or brings it down to levels of plain-spokenness at
which it should declare itself to a westem mind. Here, again, is
the Chinese characteristic: the touch is lighter; more is left
to