Liezi: All things come out of the machine, all into the machine

After Liezi arrived at Weiguo, he began his life of traveling all over the world.

One day, Liezi was sweating profusely when he suddenly noticed a skull exposed to the haystack on the side of the road, which looked like it was a hundred years old. Without hurrying or worrying, he picked it up, removed the weeds stuck to it, patted off the dirt attached to it, carefully examined it for a while, and then pointed to the skull and said to his disciple Baifeng with some understanding:

"Only I and you in this world understand the truth of life and death. Take this skull as an example, we usually live a life of pampering, thinking that we are very proud and satisfied, in fact, to put it bluntly, what is the difference between our life and this skull lying quietly in the haystack, because after looking at life and death, the living person will be a pile of white bones after a hundred years, so what is precious about our life? ”

This change of life and death is something that nothing can avoid! As for how much has changed, it is difficult to say. As long as it is a living organism, it can produce countless new life in the process of its "transformation", such as a field chicken, commonly known as a shrimp toad, which will grow long claws and become quail after a long period of time in the field (1).

The quail is a pure bird, and when it flies, it must be attached to the grass and dare not stay away. Because if it accidentally touches the water, it will become a kind of grass like silk, and the grass will become moss when nourished by the water and soil, and if these mosses are born in a clean and convex place, it will become plantain. Plantains suck up dirt and other filth and turn into black-footed grass.

After a long time, the roots of the black-footed grass will become scorpions, and the leaves of the black-footed grass will become butterflies, and the butterflies will soon turn into larvae. If these larvae grow under the stove, they become like newly shelled young insects called "Plovers", and after a thousand days they become birds, called "Dry Bones", the spit in the mouth of the Dry Bones will become "Si Mi", and the Si Mi will become "Eating Worms", which is vinegar worms, and this vinegar worm called "Eating Yellow Worm" can also be changed from "Eating Yellow Worm", and eating Yellow Worm is born from the "Nine Worms", and the Nine Worms are born from the "Worms", and the Worms are born from the "Worms", and the Worms are born from the "Worms", and the Worms are born from the "Worms".

In addition, there are more peculiar chemical machines, I heard that after the sheep liver is thrown on the ground for a long time, it will turn into a bird, called "digao", and the horse blood will turn into a ghost fire called "turning neighbor" after a long time, and the blood of people will also become wildfire.

Judging from the transformation of the above various types of things, the harrier becomes a harrier, the dove becomes a cuckoo, and the cuckoo turns into the original harrier. Even swallows flying in the air will become clams swimming in the water, amphibious field chickens will become quails that live in the water and grass, rotten melons will become fish when they fall into the water, and old and yellow cabbage will not be picked, and after a long time, they will become amaranth. In addition, the ewe grows old and wrinkled to become an ape, and the fish eggs hatch into small insects squirming in the water, which are all strange things about nature.

According to the ancient books, there is a kind of beast on the mountain, looking like a fox, and there are thick curly hairs on the head, called "class", this kind of beast called the class, there is no male, as long as a large number of females are together, they will naturally conceive and give birth, they rely on this "homosexuality" to reproduce.

What is more absolute is that there is a kind of water bird called "harrier", as long as the male and female bird look at each other fixedly, they will become pregnant and produce small birds. There is also a kind of turtle, which is all female in pure color, called "Big Essential"; pure and all color is male, called "wasp". Both species of turtles are capable of growing on their own without mating, and this production is the result of changes caused by the feeling of the two sexes.

The above are all examples of animals feeling each other, in fact, people are the same, there are many changes.

There is a passage in the Great Desolation Sutra (2).

OOCL has a country called "Si you guo", and that country is divided into two groups of men and women, and the male group is called "Si Shi", and they will never marry a wife for the rest of their lives. The group of women is called "thinking women", and they do not need husbands. It is strange to say that they are not married and mated, as long as they look at each other with their eyes like the birds, they will naturally be moved and give birth to children.

The birth of Zhou's ancestor Hou Ji is even more peculiar.

Hou Ji's mother, Jiang Yan, went to the wild one day to play, and on the way she stumbled upon a large footprint on the ground, she felt surprised and funny, so she tried to use her own foot to step on this big footprint, compared to see how much difference. Who knows, she just stepped on the big footprints, her whole body seemed to be touched by something, and soon after she returned, she became pregnant, and then gave birth to a little boy, that is, Houji.

The birth of Tang's sage Yi Yin is also very special.

I heard that there used to be a Xinguo in the East, and one day, a girl carried a basket to Sanglin to pick mulberry. Suddenly she heard the cry of the baby, so she followed the sound and found a fat doll in a hollow old mulberry tree, naked and dancing and crying. The girl picked up the doll and offered it to the king.

The king sent someone to investigate the origin of the baby, and it took many days to find out that the child's mother originally lived on the shore of the Yishui River. This mother, one night, dreamed that the gods told her: "If the rice mortar is out of the water, run to the east, and don't look back." ”

The next day, The rice mortar was indeed out of the water, she quickly told the neighbors what God said to her, while following the instructions to the east, the neighbors believed her words and went east with her, those who did not believe were still watching at home, she could not take care of so much, and walked quickly to the east for about ten miles, because she was worried about the home and neighbors, I don't know what is going on now, I can't help but look back, only to see that the home has become a white expanse, the gushing flood is surging towards her, she is trying to shout, her body has become a hollow old mulberry tree, standing in the middle of the water, Resisting the rapids, the flood slowly receded in front of her. After some days, when the mulberry girl came to pick mulberry, she found that there was a child in the belly of this hollow mulberry tree, and according to the testimony of neighbors, this child was indeed a hollow tree, and because the child's mother originally lived in Yishui, she named Yi Yin and became the sage of tang when she grew up.

Since the big footprint can make a person pregnant and the empty mulberry wood can give birth to children, it is not surprising that the cockroach (acete worm) worm is generated by the moist qi, and the chicken (vinegar worm) is born of the acid gas in the wine. Even "Sheep Xi Grass" can be mixed with "No Bamboo Shoots" and "JiuZhu" to produce "Qingning Worm". Qingning insects also give birth to "Cheng" (Cheng is a kind of beast, the Yue people call the leopard Cheng), from Cheng to the horse, from the horse to the man, the person returned to the microbial "organism".

From these many changes in "entering the machine" and "leaving the machine", it can be imagined that the changes in life and death are unpredictable, and those born here may just die from the other, so why bother with life and death?

The saints understood the truth that "life does not exist forever" and "death does not perish forever", so they do not like to live, nor are they afraid of death, and the changes in all forms are finally immortalized, so "all things come out of chance, all enter into chance"

The former said: "Those who have deep lust are shallow, and those who have shallow lust are deep." "It is only because we understand this opportunity that we can not harm life, and can we see living people as no different from skulls."

【Notes】

(1) From shrimp toad to quail to old ewe to ape, these are all rumors that the wisdom of the ancestors has not been opened, and Liezi uses these rumors to explain the changes in life, which can be described as a romantic achievement, and there is no need to discuss it in today's science.

(2) The title of the Classic of Mountains and Seas. The Classic of Mountains and Seas includes the Great Wilderness East Classic, the Great Wilderness West Classic, the Great Wilderness South Classic, and the Great Wilderness North Classic.

……

Excerpt | Liezi: A Philosophy Of Walking Against the Wind

Compiled | Luo Zhaojin

Publishing | Kyushu Publishing Co., Ltd.

Treasure House of Chinese Classics • 3rd Series 23 • Philosophy of Walking in the Wind: Liezi ¥36 Purchase

In the form of fables, myths, stories, and essays, Liezi reveals subtle philosophies. The truth of "changing with the passage of time, changing things", the extremely happy realism, the display of authentic human nature, the living reality and the bubble of truth and illusion, the realization of life, the simplicity of the words and lines.

This book is a rewrite, and we can see that people's outlook on life in that distant era is exactly what people admire today.